He had for a long time forsaken his cabin,
which was too far distant from his hunting-grounds.
If he had a stock of provision on hand, he still pursued the goats as
usual, but only for his personal gratification. If he caught one, he
contented himself with slitting its ear; this was his seal, the mark
by which he recognized his free flock. During the last years of his
abode in the island, he had killed or marked thus nearly five
hundred.[1]
[Footnote 1: Long after his departure from Juan Fernandez, the ship's
crews, who came there for supplies, or the pirates who took refuge
there, found goats whose ears had been slit by Selkirk's knife.]
In the natural course of things, as his physical powers increased, his
intelligence became enfeebled.
Necessity had at first aroused his industry, for all industry awakes
at the voice of want; but his own had been due rather to his
recollections than to his ingenuity. He thought himself a creator, he
was only an imitator.
Whatever may have been said by those who, in the pride of a deceitful
philosophy, have wished to glorify the power of the solitary man--if
the latter, supported by certain fortunate circumstances, can remain
some time in a state hardly endurable, it is not by his own strength,
but by means which society itself has furnished.
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