I soon found that I needed many things to make me comfortable. First I
wanted a chair and a table, for without them I must live like a savage.
So I set to work. I had never handled a tool in my life, but I had a
saw, an axe, and several hatchets, and I soon learned to use them all.
If I wanted a board, I had to chop down a tree. From the trunk of the
tree I cut a log of the length my board was to be. Then I split the log,
and, with infinite labour, hewed it flat till it was as thin as a board.
I made myself a table and a chair out of short pieces of board, and from
the large boards I made some wide shelves. On these I laid my tools and
other things.

From time to time I made many useful things. From a piece of ironwood,
cut in the forest with great labour, I made a spade to dig with. Then I
wanted a pick-axe, but for long I could not think how I was to get one.
At length I made use of crowbars from the wreck. These I heated in the
fire, and, little by little, shaped them till I made a pick-axe, proper
enough, though heavy.

At first I felt the need of baskets in which to carry things, so I set
to work as a basket-maker. It came to my mind that the twigs of the tree
whence I cut my stakes might serve. I found them to my purpose as much
as I could desire, and, during the next rainy season, I employed myself
in making a great many baskets. Though I did not finish them handsomely,
yet I made them sufficiently serviceable.

I had, however, one want greater than all the others--bread. My barley
was very fine, the grains were large and smooth; but before I could make
bread I must grind the grains into flour. I spent many a day to find out
a Stone to cut hollow and make fit for a mortar, and could find none;
nor were the rocks of the island of hardness sufficient. So I gave it