With some threads and the fat of his game, he contrived a lamp; still later, he had oil, and reeds served him for wicks.
Dating from this moment, the entire island paid tribute to him; the crabs, the eels, the flesh of the agouti, savory like that of the rabbit, by turns figured on his table.

When he seasoned them with some morsels of pork, substituting ship biscuit for bread, his repasts were fit for an admiral.
Although the goats had become wild, like the other inhabitants of the island, since all had learned the nature of man, and of the thunder, which he directed at his will, Selkirk still surprised them within gun-shot.

Not only was their flesh profitable for food; their horns, long and hollow, served to contain powder and other small articles necessary to his house-keeping; of their skins he made carpets, coverings, and bags to protect his provisions from dampness.

He even manufactured a game-pouch, which he constantly carried when hunting.
His salt fish, his biscuit, some well smoked quarters of goat's flesh, and the productions of his fish-pond, at present constitute a store on which he can live for a long time, without any care, but to ameliorate his condition.
He is now in possession of all the enjoyments he has coveted, abundance, leisure, absolute freedom.
And yet, his brow is sometimes clouded, and an unaccountable uneasiness torments him; something seems wanting; his appetite fails, his courage grows feeble, his reveries are painfully prolonged.

But, by mature reflection, he has discovered the cause of the evil.
What is it that is so essential to his happiness?
Tobacco.
Our factitious wants often exercise over us a more tyrannical empire, than our real ones; it seems as if we clung with more force and tenacity to this second nature, because we have ourselves created it; it originates in us; the other originates with God, and is common to all! Selkirk now persuades himself that tobacco alone is wanting to his comfort; it is this privation which throws him into these sorrowful fits of languor.