I was born in the year 1632, in the city of York. That was my mother’s hometown, because she also was born there, in a family of Robinson’s. They were very old and gentle family of York’s faubourg[1], from whom I was called Robinson. My father, bored the name Kreutznaer, was German from Bremen. He earned his bread[2] by trading, and, when his case went to the mountain[3], he moved to England, York. There he met my mother and later they got married. Eventually, the surname Kreutznaer grown into the Crusoe, by the usual corruption of words in England. Therefore, everyone calls me Robinson Crusoe.
I had two elder brothers. One of them went to the army, despite of my father’s prohibitions, and was killed at the battle near Dunkirk. What became of the second brother we never knew, he was missing.
From my childhood I dreamed about the adventures and pirates. I would be satisfied with nothing but going to sea.
Being the third son of my family, I wasn’t a high-educated person. My father had given me house-education and country free school that was enough to be a lawyer[4].
When I grew up, my childish dreams of the sea turned into the real wish of becoming a captain, or a sailor at least. Oh, how the sea haunted my dreams that days!
My father, being a wise and grave man, guessed my intentions[5]. One morning he called me into his chamber. He asked me very warmly not to leave father’s home and not to repeat the fate of my elder brothers in a search of adventures. “You don’t have to earn your bread”, he said, “I’ll give you enough money to stay at your native country, become a lawyer, and get married. You are only eighteen, and I don’t want to lose my third son, when he is so young”. But I didn’t listen to him. He promised me a life of ease and pleasure, but I was going to a life of risky adventures and trying the fortune.
However, I was sincerely[6] affected with my father’s discourse, and decided to wait with the final decision of my future life. I resolved not to think of going abroad one year more, but to settle at home, according to my father’s desire. That was a time when I was trying myself in the different fields of learning, trying to find a profession that would be close to me. But my searches had been unsuccessful. It turned out, that I had no abilities to any crafts[7]. After that, I had finally decided to link my future life with[8] the sea. However, I could not leave my parent’s home without their approval[9].
One day, when my mother was in a good mood, I asked her for the help.
“Oh, mother, I’ll soon be nineteen years old, and it is too late to become a lawyer or a clerk. I have no abilities to any crafts. I see no ways to make living, but go to sea. Please, speak to my father to let me go abroad and become a mariner!”
This put my mother into a great passion[10]. She wondered how I could think this way after the discourse I had had with my father, and such a kind and tender expression that she knew my father had used on me.
“Neither I, nor your father will bless you. If you don’t obey our advice, we will not take part in your future,” she said.