ssary, and that was an
earthen pot, not only to hold my liquid, but also to bear the fire,
which none of these could do. It once happened that as I was putting out
my fire, I found therein a broken piece of one of my vessels burnt as
hard as a rock, and red as a tile. This made me think of burning some
pots; and having no notion of a kiln, or of glazing them with leaf, I
fixed three large pipkins, and two or three pots in a pile one upon
another. The fire I piled round the outside, and dry wood on the top,
till I saw the pots in the inside red hot, and found out that, they were
net crackt at all: and when I perceived them perfectly red, I let one of
them stand in the fire about five or six hours, till the clay melted by
the extremity of the heat, and would have run to glass, had I suffered
it; upon which I slacked my fire by degrees, till the redness abated;
and watching them till the morning, I found I had three very good
pipkins, and two earthen pots, as well burnt and fit for my turn as I
could desire.

No joy could be greater than mine at this discovery. For after this, I
may say, I wanted for no fort of earthen ware. I filled one of my
pipkins with water to boil me some meat, which it did admirably well,
and with a piece of kid I made me some good broth, as well as my
circumstances would afford me at that time.

The next concern I had was to get me a stone-morter to beat some corn
in, instead of a mill to grind it. Here indeed I was at a great loss, as
not being fit for a stone-cutter; and many days I spent to find out a
great stone big enough to cut hollow and make fit for a morter, and
strong enough to bear the weight of a pestil, and that would break the
corn without filling it with sand. But all the stones of the island
being of a mouldering nature, rendered my search fruitless; and then I
resolved to look out for a great block of hard wood, which having found,
I formed it with my ax and hammer, and then, with infinite labour, made
a hollow in it, just as the Indians of Brazil make their canoes. When I
had finished this, I made a great pestil of iron wood, and then laid
them up against my succeeding harvest.

My next business was to make me a sieve, to sift my meal and part it
from the bran and husk. Having no fine thin canvas to search the meal
through, I could not tell what to do. What linen I had was reduced to
rags: I had goat's hair, enough, but neither tools to work it, nor did I
know how to spin it: A