The Swiss Family Robinson - Or, Adventures in a Desert Island #271803

Tms famous book is known in many' languages, but its title is not always understood. The Swiss missionary who is said to have sailed from Tahiti for New Holland and was wrecked not so very far from New Guinea did not bear the name of Robinson but was given that name by Kampe as appropriate to the Robinson Crusoe sort of life he led on his island. The two books have been classed together for years and are familiarly known to thousands. In Crusoe we have the resourceful individual in this book we have the resourceful family under the guidance of a worthy leader. Robinson Crusoe is based on the life of Alexander Selkirk on an island about 9000 miles away from the mouth of the Orinoco where Defoe makes the wreck occur on a voyage from Brazil to Barbados in this book the missionary's island is not shifted in position and the author has done no violence to geography, but he has let his imagination run riot in a collection of animals and plants, beyond the wildest dreams of any possible naturalist, that furnish ample opportunity for the incidents and adventures amid which the boys grow to manhood. It is to the boys that the success of the book is due, for they are alive and alert and differ from each other as boys of a family generally do, and they are not only read about but become the reader's friends.