head, for I am resolved to have my liberty:" so he turned himself about,
and swam for the shore, and I make no doubt but he reached it with ease,
for he was an excellent swimmer.

I could have been content to have taken this Moor with me, and have
drowned the boy, but there was no venturing to trust him. When he was
gone I turned to the boy, whom they called Xury, and said to him, "Xury,
if you will be faithful to me I'll make you a great man; but if you will
not stroke your face to be true to me," that is, swear by Mahomet and
his father's beard, "I must throw you into the sea too." The boy smiled
in my face, and spoke so innocently, that I could not mistrust him; and
swore to be faithful to me, and go all over the world with me.

While I was in view of the Moor that was swimming, I stood out directly
to sea with the boat, rather stretching to windward, that they might
think me gone towards the Straits' mouth; (as indeed any one that had
been in their wits must have been supposed to do) for who would have
supposed we were sailed on to the southward to the truly Barbarian
coast, where whole nations of Negroes were sure to surround us with the
canoes, and destroy us; where we could never once go on shore but we
should be devoured by savage beasts, or more merciless savages of
human kind?

But as soon as it grew dusk in the evening, I changed my course, and
steered directly south and by east, bending my course a little toward
the east, that I might keep in with the shore; and having a fair, fresh
gale of wind, and a smooth, quiet sea, I made such sail that I believe
by the next day at three o'clock in the afternoon, when I first made the
land, I could not be less than 150 miles south of Sallee; quite beyond
the Emperor of Morocco's dominions, or indeed of any other king