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 distrust 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 their canoes and destroy us; where we could not go
on shore but we should be devoured by savage beasts, or more
merciless savages of human kind.
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