He told upon his fingers seventeen.

I asked him then what became of them.

He told me, "They live, they dwell at my nation." This put new thoughts into my head; for I presently imagined that these might be the men belonging to the ship that was cast away in the sight of my island, as I now called it; and who, after the ship was struck on the rock, and they saw her inevitably lost, had saved themselves in their boat, and were landed upon that wild shore among the savages.

Upon this I inquired of him more critically what was become of them.

He assured me they lived still there; that they had been there about four years; that the savages left them alone, and gave them victuals to live on.