nd of Heaven against me. "And, young man," said he, "depend
upon it, if you do not go back, wherever you go, you will meet with
nothing but disasters and disappointments, till your father's words are
fulfilled upon you."

We parted soon after; for I made him little answer, and I saw him no
more; which way he went I knew not. As for me, having some money in my
pocket, I travelled to London by land; and there, as well as on the road,
had many struggles with myself what course of life I should take, and
whether I should go home or to sea.

As to going home, shame opposed the best motions that offered to my
thoughts, and it immediately occurred to me how I should be laughed at
among the neighbours, and should be ashamed to see, not my father and
mother only, but even everybody else; from whence I have since often
observed, how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is,
especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such
cases--viz. that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to
repent; not ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be
esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make
them be esteemed wise men.

In this state of life, however, I remained some time, uncertain what
measures to take, and what course of life to lead. An irresistible
reluctance continued to going home; and as I stayed away a while, the
remembrance of the distress I had been in wore off, and as that abated,
the little motion I had in my desires to return wore off with it, till at
last I quite laid aside the thoughts of it, and looked out for a voyage.

CHAPTER II--SLAVERY AND ESCAPE

That evil influence which carried me first away from my father's
house--which hurried me into the wild and indigested notion of raising my
fortune, and that impressed those conceits so forcibly upon me as to make
me deaf to all good advice, and to the entreaties and even the commands
of my father--I say, the same influence, whatever it was, presented the
most unfortunate of all enterprises to my view; and I went on board a
vessel bound to the coast of Africa; or, as our sailors vulgarly called
it, a voyage to Guinea.

It was my great misfortune that in all these adventures I did not ship
myself as a sailor; when, though I might indeed have worked a little
harder than ordinary, yet at the same time I should have learnt the duty
and office of a fore-mast man, and in time might ha