Lord." It is
impossible to express the comfort this gave me. In answer, I thankfully
laid down the book, and was no more sad, at least on that occasion.

In the middle of these cogitations, apprehensions, and reflections, it
came into my thoughts one day, that all this might be a mere chimera of
my own, and that this foot might be the print of my own foot, when I
came on shore from my boat: this cheered me up a little too, and I began
to persuade myself it was all a delusion; that it was nothing else but
my own foot: and why might I not come that way from the boat, as well as
I was going that way to the boat? Again, I considered also, that I could
by no means tell, for certain, where I had trod, and where I had not;
and that if, at last, this was only the print of my own foot, I had
played the part of those fools who try to make stories of spectres and
apparitions, and then are frightened at them more than any body.

Now I began to take courage, and to peep abroad again, for I had not
stirred out of my castle for three days and nights, so that I began to
starve for provisions; for I had little or nothing within doors but some
barley-cakes and water: then I knew that my goats wanted to be milked
too, which usually was my evening diversion; and the poor creatures were
in great pain and inconvenience for want of it; and, indeed, it almost
spoiled some of them, and almost dried up their milk. Encouraging
myself, therefore, with the belief that this was nothing but the print
of one of my own feet, and that I might be truly said to start at my own
shadow, I began to go abroad again, and went to my country-house to milk
my flock: but to see with what fear I went forward, how often I looked
behind me, how I was ready, every now and then, to lay down my basket,
and run for my life, it would have made any one have thought I was
haunted with an evil conscience, or that I had been lately most terribly
frightened; and so, indeed, I had. However, as I went down thus two or
three days, and having seen nothing, I began to be a little bolder, and
to think there was really nothing in it but my own imagination; but I
could not persuade myself fully of this till I should go down to the
shore again, and see this print of a foot, and measure it by my own, and
see if there was any similitude or fitness, that I might be assured it
was my own foot: but when I came to the place, first, it appeared
evidently to me, that when I laid up my boat, I