pain caused by the contusions resulting from his fall, he bethinks
himself of the means of escape.

But a circle of sharp rocks, contracting from the base to the summit,
forms a tunnel over his head; no crevice, no precipitous ledge,
interrupts their fatal uniformity. Only around him some platforms of
sandy earth appear; he digs them with his knife, to form steps. Some
fragments of roots project here and there through the interstices of
the stones; he hopes to find a point of support by which to scale
these abrupt walls. The little solidity of the roots, which give way
in his grasp; his sufferings, which become more intense at every
effort; these thousand rocky heads bending at once over him; all tell
him plainly that it will be impossible for him to emerge from this
hole--that it is destined to be his tomb.

Poor young sailor, already condemned to isolation, separated from the
rest of mankind, could he have foreseen that one day his captivity was
to be still closer! that his steps would be chained, that the sight
even of his island would be interdicted! and that in this desert,
where he had neither persecutor nor jailer to fear, he would find a
prison, a dungeon!

After three days of anguish and tortures, after new and ineffectual
attempts,--exhausted by fatigue, by thirst, by hunger,--consumed by
fever, supervened in consequence of all his sufferings of body and
soul, he resigns himself to his fate; with his foot, he prepares his
last couch, composed of sand and dried leaves shaken from above by the
neighboring trees; he lies down, folds his arms, closes his eyes, and
prepares to die, thinking of his eternal salvation.