n I had done this, I was unable to stir it up again, or to get
under it, much less to move it forward towards the water; so I was forced
to give it over; and yet, though I gave over the hopes of the boat, my
desire to venture over for the main increased, rather than decreased, as
the means for it seemed impossible.

This at length put me upon thinking whether it was not possible to make
myself a canoe, or periagua, such as the natives of those climates make,
even without tools, or, as I might say, without hands, of the trunk of a
great tree. This I not only thought possible, but easy, and pleased
myself extremely with the thoughts of making it, and with my having much
more convenience for it than any of the negroes or Indians; but not at
all considering the particular inconveniences which I lay under more than
the Indians did--viz. want of hands to move it, when it was made, into
the water--a difficulty much harder for me to surmount than all the
consequences of want of tools could be to them; for what was it to me, if
when I had chosen a vast tree in the woods, and with much trouble cut it
down, if I had been able with my tools to hew and dub the outside into
the proper shape of a boat, and burn or cut out the inside to make it
hollow, so as to make a boat of it--if, after all this, I must leave it
just there where I found it, and not be able to launch it into the water?

One would have thought I could not have had the least reflection upon my
mind of my circumstances while I was making this boat, but I should have
immediately thought how I should get it into the sea; but my thoughts
were so intent upon my voyage over the sea in it, that I never once
considered how I should get it off the land: and it was really, in its
own nature, more easy for me to guide it over forty-five miles of sea
than about forty-five fathoms of land, where it lay, to set it afloat in
the water.

I went to work upon this boat the most like a fool that ever man did who
had any of his senses awake. I pleased myself with the design, without
determining whether I was ever able to undertake it; not but that the
difficulty of launching my boat came often into my head; but I put a stop
to my inquiries into it by this foolish answer which I gave myself--"Let
me first make it; I warrant I will find some way or other to get it along
when it is done."

This was a most preposterous method; but the eagerness of my fancy
prevailed, and to work I went.