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  .., 2026.



Daniel Defoe  

Captain Singleton  



Life and adventures of a pirate    

glorious Captain Singleton   

Great men, whose lives are remarkable and whose deeds require transmission to posterity, usually talk a lot about their origins, give detailed accounts of their families and the stories of their ancestors, and I, to be precise, will also follow their example, although my pedigree is very short, as you yourself will now see.  ,        ,      ,           ,  ,   ,    ,     ,     .

If I may believe the woman I used to call my mother, I was a little boy of about two years old and very well dressed, and one fine summer evening my nurse carried me out into a field near Islington, so that, as she said, the child might get some fresh air;   ,     ,  ,         ,          , ,   ,    ; She was accompanied by a neighbor, a girl of twelve or fourteen.   ,    . The nurse, by arrangement or by chance, met a young man, probably her lover;          , ,  ; He took her to a tavern to treat her to beer and cake;         ; and while they were amusing themselves inside, the girl held me in her arms and walked about the garden and at the door, sometimes in sight, sometimes moving away, suspecting nothing evil.     ,            ,   ,   ,    .

Then a woman came up who was apparently engaged in stealing children.   , , ,   . Such a devilish activity was not uncommon at that time:       : they stole well-dressed small children, or older children, for sale on plantations.     ,    ,    .

The woman took me in her arms and began to kiss and play with me.            . She took the girl quite far from the house and told her a whole story, asked her to go tell the nanny where and with whom the child was;           ,     ,     ; that the noble lady liked the child, and she was playing with him and kissing him;     ,        ; that there was nothing to be afraid of, that they were not far from here.   ,    . When the girl left, she dragged me away.    ,    .

Then I was sold to a beggar woman who needed a pretty child, and then to a gypsy woman, who kept me until I was about six years old.    ,     ,   ,        . Although I was dragged from one end of the country to the other with this woman, I did not need anything and called her mother;             ,          ; She also told me that she was not my mother, but bought me for twelve shillings from another woman, who told her where she got me and gave her my name:    ,     ,         ,  ,   ,     : Bob Singleton.  .

My kind mother, a gypsy, probably later ended up on the gallows for some kind of misdeed;   , , ,   -    ; Since I was too young at that time to beg, the parish (which one, I dont remember) took me into its care.         ,  ,   (    )     . I still remember how I went to the parish school and how the dean convinced me to be a good boy;     ,              ; that although, he said, I was a poor boy, but if I knew the catechism and served God, then I could become a good person.  , ,    , ,       ,     .

I think I wandered a great deal from town to town, as parishes disputed as to the last residence of my supposed mother. ,        ,      ,       . The last town I lived in was near the sea.  ,   ,    . There I caught the fancy of a shipbuilder, who took me to a place near Southampton.     ,        . This was, as I afterwards learned, Besleton;  ,    , ; there I assisted the carpenters and other people who were building a ship for him.       ,    . And then, though I was not yet twelve years old, he took me with him on a voyage to Newfoundland.  ,       ,         .

I lived well, the master liked me so much that he called me his boy;   ,    ,      ; I would have called him father, but he forbade it, because he had his own children.     ,   ,       . I made three or four voyages with him and became a tall and robust youth, but one day, on returning from the Newfoundland shoals, we fell into the hands of an Algerian pirate warship.              ,  ,     ,     . If I am not mistaken, this happened in 1695, but I do not remember exactly, since I, of course, did not keep a journal.   ,    1695 ,    ,    , ,  .

The Turks finished off my master, but they spared me, only beating me mercilessly with sticks on the soles of my feet, so much so that I could neither walk nor stand for several days.    ,   ,      ,  ,        ,  .

But fortune smiled on me.    . While towing our prize ship, the Turkish corsair, on his way to Gibraltar, in sight of the Gulf of Cadiz, met two large Portuguese warships, was captured and taken to Lisbon.      ,      ,    ,      ,      .

I did not understand what consequences my capture could have, and therefore I was not very happy about my release.   ,      ,      . And it was not a real release for me, since I was starving in a foreign country, where I did not know anyone and could not speak a word of the local language.         ,       ,              . When all of our people were released, wherever they wanted, I, since I had nowhere to go, remained for a few more days on the ship, until one of the officers noticed me and asked what this English puppy was doing there and why he had not yet been driven ashore.     ,   , ,      ,      ,          ,                .

I guessed what he was talking about and was afraid, because I did not know how I would earn my living.  ,    ,  ,    ,      . Then the ship's pilot, an old sailor who spoke broken English, took me with him.   ,  ,     ,    . I lived with him for about two years, until he finished his business and became chief pilot, or helmsman, to Don Garisa de Pimentesia de Carravalhas, captain of a Portuguese galleon or carrack bound for Goa, in the East Indies.       ,           ,   ,       ,    ,   ,  -. Having received the appointment, he took me on board the ship to look after his cabin, which he loaded with liqueurs, cordials, sugar, spices and other supplies for pleasure on the journey, and, in addition, a fair quantity of European goods:  ,     ,      ,    , , ,        , ,  ,    : fine lace, linen, calico, woolen fabric and the like, under the guise of his own clothes.  , , ,     ,    .

I knew too little about the business to keep a travel journal, although my master - for a Portuguese he understood the business well - urged me to do so.      ,    ,               . But my ignorance of the Portuguese language hindered me;       ; at least, that was my excuse.   ,   . However, I soon began to look at his maps and notes. ,         . And since I wrote well and knew a little Latin, I soon began to understand the Portuguese language and acquired a superficial knowledge of navigation, insufficient, however, for such an adventurous life as mine.      ,   ,              , , ,     ,  . In short, I learned a few things while sailing with the Portuguese, but mainly learned to be a wandering thief and a bad sailor;  ,       -,          ; and I dare say that in the whole world for both of these matters you will not find better teachers than the Portuguese.   ,             .

But as the proverb goes:   : when you live with wolves, howl like a wolf, I adapted to them as best I could.     -      ,  . My master allowed me to serve the captain.   ,    . Since the captain gave the master half a moydor for a month for my work and recorded it in the ship's books, I expected that in India, when they paid four months' wages, my master would give me something too.               ,   ,   ,      ,    -  .

But he apparently decided otherwise.  , ,  . When I spoke to him about this in Goa, where my salary was paid, he became furious, called me an English dog, a young heretic, and promised to hand me over to the Inquisition.    ,   ,     ,   ,    ,      .

Then I decided to run away from him, but it was impossible, because there was not a single European ship in the port, but only two or three Persian ships from Hormuz, so that if I ran away from him, he would seize me on the shore and bring me on board by force;      ,    ,          ,         ,  ,    ,            ; I had to endure it for the time being.    ,  . But he treated me so badly, beat me and tormented me for every trifle, that, in a word, I became unbearable.       ,        , , ,   .

The cruel treatment and the impossibility of escape forced me to think up all sorts of villainy, and finally, convinced of the futility of this, I decided to kill him.           , , ,    ,    . With this devilish thought I spent nights and days, trying to carry it out.         ,     . But I could not commit the murder, since I had neither a pistol nor a saber;      ,        ,  ; I thought about poison, but did not know where to get one;    ,   ,   ; and even if I knew, I would not have been able to ask in a foreign language.     ,        .



I cant tell you anything about the return voyage, since I didnt keep a journal.        ,      . I remember that at the Cape of Good Hope we were stopped by a furious storm from the west-west-south, which drove us east for six days, until, after a few days, we finally dropped anchor off the coast of Madagascar. ,           --,      ,       , ,    .

Then a mutiny broke out among the crew due to some shortage of rations, and it got to the point that the mutineers threatened to put the captain ashore and take the ship back to Goa.      - -   ,    ,           ,  . I wished this with all my heart, for I was embittered.      ,    . Although I was still, as they said, a boy, I incited the mutiny as best I could, and joined it so openly that I barely escaped hanging, for the captain noticed that one of the gang had decided to kill him.    ,   , ,    ,  ,      ,    ,   ,  -     . And so, acting by bribery and promises, as well as threats and torture, he persuaded two young men to open up and, extorting names from them, seized people.  ,    ,     ,       ,    ,  . Since one gave away the other, no less than sixteen people ended up in chains, including me.     ,        ,     .

The captain, enraged by the danger, decided to clear the ship of his enemies, tried us, and we were condemned to death. ,  ,      ,  ,      . I was too young to understand how the trial went.    ,  ,   . But the ship's commissary and one of the gunners were hanged immediately, and I expected the same for the others.         ,        . However, I was not particularly upset by this. ,     .

However, the captain limited himself to executing two, and the rest, in view of their requests and promises to improve, he pardoned, but ordered some, including me, to be landed on the shore and left there.     ,  ,      , ,  ,     ,      .

I was a young man, only seventeen or eighteen years old.    ,     . However, when I learned what was in store for me, I did not lose my head and asked what my master had to say about it, and I heard that he had used all his influence to save me, and the captain replied that he left it to his discretion whether I should go ashore or stay on the ship and be hanged. , ,   ,     ,      ,  ,        ,   ,   ,     ,     ,        . Then I gave up all hope of pardon.       . I was not very grateful to the master for his requests on my behalf, knowing that he was not looking out for me, but for himself, wanting to keep my wages, about six dollars a month, including the money the captain had put in for my personal service.           , ,      ,    ,    ,    ,    ,        .

When I learned that my master was so outwardly kind, I asked if I could speak to him; ,      ,  ,      ; I was told that it was possible if he came down to me, but I could not go to him;  ,  ,     ,      ; then I asked them to tell the master to come to me, and he did.     ,     ,   . I fell on my knees before him and asked forgiveness for all my misdeeds;            ; I almost confessed to the intention of killing him, but wisely refrained from it.         ,     . He said that he had tried to obtain forgiveness from the captain, but without success, and that I had no choice but to submit to fate;  ,      ,  ,     ; if he had to meet any Portuguese ship at the Cape of Good Hope, he would ask the captain of that ship to pick us up.           -  ,        .

Then I asked him to give me back my clothes.       . He said he was afraid they would be of little use to me, since he did not know how we would live on the island:  ,  ,      ,    ,     : he had heard that its inhabitants were cannibals or cannibals (although this assertion was unfounded), and that we would not survive among them.  ,     ,   (    ),       . I answered that I was not afraid of this, but of starvation;  ,    ,   ; and as for the cannibals, we would rather eat them than they us, if only we could get to them. But I am depressed, I said, that we have no weapons and nothing to defend ourselves with, and I ask you to give us a musket, a sabre, gunpowder and bullets.    ,     ,   ,      ,   ,   ,         ,      , ,   .

He smiled and said that it would not help, since it was unlikely that we would survive among the numerous wild tribe inhabiting the island.    ,    ,          ,  . I answered him that he would at least make our lot easier by ensuring that we would not be killed and eaten immediately, and I begged him to give me a musket.   ,       ,       ,     . Finally, he said that he did not know whether the captain would allow him to give me a musket, and without permission he did not dare, but he promised to try to get this permission;   ,   ,       ,      ,      ; He obtained it and the next day sent me a musket and provisions for it, but said that the captain would not allow us to give them to us until we were landed and the sails began to be set.               ,  ,       ,           . He also sent me my clothes.      .

Two days later we were put ashore;       ; the rest of my comrades, hearing that I had received a musket, gunpowder and bullets, asked for the same for themselves.   , ,    ,   ,    . Their request was respected, and we were left on the shore to the mercy of fate.    ,        .

The ship spent another two weeks in those parts, repairing the damage from the last storm and taking on fuel and water;        ,          ; and all this time the boat often went ashore, bringing us all kinds of food, and the natives, thinking that we were people from the ship, behaved peacefully.         ,    ,  , ,      ,   . We lived on the shore in a hut that we built from branches, and at night we went into the nearest forest so that the natives would think that we were on the ship.      ,    ,       ,  ,    . We soon discovered that they were fierce and treacherous and only held back out of fear, and we were afraid that as soon as the ship left, we would fall into their hands.   ,          ,   , ,    ,     .

The thought of this drove my comrades in misfortune almost to madness;            ; and one of them, a carpenter, in a fit of madness, swam at night to a ship lying a league from the shore, and begged so piteously to be taken on board that the captain finally allowed him to be picked up after the swimmer had been tossing and turning for three hours in the water.    , ,   ,    ,    ,    ,     ,      ,  ,       .




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