Whether the _Cavalier_ is pure fiction, or partly embroidered fact, _is_ a somewhat interesting question, if only because it seems to be impossible to find out the answer: and the same may be said of the not impossible (indeed almost more than probable) Portuguese maps and documents at the back of _Captain Singleton_.

To disembroil the chronological muddle of _Roxana_, and follow out the tangles of the hide-and-seek of that most unpleasant "lady of pleasure" and her daughter, may suit some.

But, apart from all these things, there abides the fact that you can _read_ the books--read them again and again--enjoy them most keenly at first and hardly less keenly afterwards, however often you repeat the reading.
As has been partly said, the means by which this effect is achieved, and also the means by which it is not, are almost equally remarkable.

The Four Elements of the novel are sometimes, and not incorrectly, said to be Plot, Character, Description, and Dialogue--Style, which some would make a fifth, being rather a characteristic in another order of division.

It is curious that Defoe is rebellious or evasive under any analysis of this kind.