Having thus fed him with boiled meat and broth, I was resolved to feast him the next day with roasting a piece of the kid; this I did by hanging it before the fire in a string, as I had seen many people do in England, setting two poles up, one on each side of a fire, and one across the top, and tying the string to the cross-stick, letting the meat turn continually: this Friday admired very much; but when he came to taste the flesh, he took so many ways to tell me how well he liked it, that I could not but understand him; and at last he told me he would never eat man’s flesh any more, which I was very glad to hear.
The next day I set him to work to beating some corn out, and sifting it in the manner I used to do, as I observed before; and he soon understood how to do it as well as I, especially after he had seen what the meaning of it was, and that it was to make bread of; for after that I let him see me make my bread, and bake it, too; and in a little time Friday was able to do all the work for me, as well as I could do it myself.
I began now to consider, that, having two mouths to feed instead of one, I must provide more ground for my harvest, and plant a larger quantity of corn than I used to do; so I marked out a larger piece of land, and began the fence in the same manner as before, in which Friday not only worked very willingly and very hard, but did it very cheerfully; and I told him what it was for, that it was for corn to make more bread, because he was now with me, and that I might have enough for him and myself, too; he appeared very sensible of that part, and let me know that he thought I had much more labour upon me on his account than I had for myself, and that he would work the harder for me, if I would tell him what to do.
This was the pleasantest year of all the life I led in this place. Friday began to talk pretty well, and understand the names of almost every thing I had occasion to call for, and of every place I had to send him to, and talked a great deal to me; so that, in short, I began to have some use for my tongue again, which indeed I had very little occasion for before—that is to say, about speech. Besides the pleasure of talking to him, I had a singular satisfaction in the fellow himself; his simple unfeigned honesty appeared to me more and more every day, and I began really to love the creature; and on his side, I believe, he loved me more than ever it was possible for him ever to love any thing before.
I had a mind once to try if he had any hankering inclination to his own country again; and having learned him English so well, that he could answer me almost any question, I asked him whether the nation that he belonged to never conquered in battle? At which he smiled, and said, “Yes, yes, we always fight the better”—that is, he meant, always get the better in fight—and so we began the following discourse:—”You always fight the better!” said I; “how came you to be taken prisoner, then, Friday?”
Friday. My nation beat much for all that.
Master. How beat? If your nation beat them, how came you to be taken?
Friday. They more than my nation in the place where me was; they take one, two, three, and me: my nation overbeat them in the yonder place, where me no was; there my nation take one, two great thousand.
Master. But why did not your side recover you from the hands of your enemies then?
Friday. They run one, two, three, and me, and make go in the canoe; my nation have no canoe that time.
Master. Well, Friday, and what does your nation do with the men they take? Do they carry them away, and eat them as these did?