Robinson Crusoe

Shortly into this section, which closes just over twenty-seven years after Crusoe’s being cast away, Crusoe saves a savage otherwise destined to be sacrificed to cannibals. The savage has escaped his war captors. This section closes eighteen months later with Crusoe and Friday, the saved savage, who becomes Crusoe’s dedicated servant, rescuing Friday’s father, as well as one Spaniard, from being beheaded and sacrificed to the same tribe that planned to sacrifice Friday. “At length he came close to me, and then he kneel’d down again, kiss’d the ground, and laid his head upon the ground” Crusoe says, describing Friday’s first actions, “[a]nd taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head; this it seems, was in token of swearing to be my slave for ever” (149).

In his long while spent with Friday, Crusoe builds a tent for Friday inside one of Crusoe’s two walls, near Crusoe’s tent and cave. Crusoe teaches Friday English, farming, and cooking, and the two develop a close working relationship. Most importantly, Crusoe teaches Friday about the Christian God—who is superior, Crusoe says, to Benamuckee, Friday’s God. Crusoe teaches Friday about Christian scriptures, and the evils of the Devil, essentially making a Christian of Friday.