When I saw the unhappy posture of my companion, I ran towards him as fleetly as ever I could, being in a terrible fright lest the boar should rend him with its tusks before I could come up with him. My very speed incommoded me when, coming to the spot where Billy lay on the ground, with the boar over him, I brought the flint-headed club down upon the beast's skull, for the blow was not near as straight and heavy as it might have been had my rush not been so headlong. However, it served to make the boar turn round to spy at its new adversary; and having now come to a standstill and collected myself, I dealt it such a blow behind the ear, with a full swing of the club, that it fell over sideways, and I did not observe that it made any movement after. I picked Billy up, and saw with great trouble that the boar had rent a great hole in his breeches and made a gash in his leg, which was bleeding very freely. "That's nothing, master," says he, when I asked him if he was much hurt; "but what d'ye say about my ugly murdering axe now? Ain't it a good one?" he asked triumphantly. "Wouldn't it kill a lion or a savage?" I owned that it had proved a very serviceable instrument indeed, and said that I would certainly make one like it for myself; but first I begged Billy to bathe his wounded leg in the lake, which he did, and in a little the bleeding stopped, and we went back to the wood, Billy declaring that he would certainly make fire in the native fashion, and we should have pork for supper. But when we got back to the dead boar, we found it already surrounded by a pack of dogs, which were tearing its flesh very gluttonously. They snarled and growled savagely when we essayed to drive them away, and knowing that it is an ill matter to part a dog from his bone, I did not think it prudent to provoke the rage of such a fierce regiment, though Billy cried out valorously that he would fight them all sooner than allow them to eat his pork. However, he gave in to my entreaty, vowing that he would have pork to eat before many days were past, and as for the dogs, he would teach them a lesson, that he would. CHAPTER THE SIXTH OF OUR SEARCH FOR SUSTENANCE AND SHELTER; WITH VARIOUS MATTERS OF MORE CONSEQUENCE TO THE CASTAWAY THAN EXCITEMENT TO THE READER This little adventure with the pigs was, I verily believe, the means of saving us from the lethargy into which we had like to have been cast by brooding on our solitude. The knowledge that there were on our island animals that might be formidable, and were certainly good for food, proved to us at once the necessity of being watchful, and of setting our wits to work to devise a means of cooking. And a thing that happened the same night showed to us that if we were to make the best of our situation, and have any comfort in our solitary life, we must take some measures for our shelter. [Sidenote: A Storm]