might resent the manner by which I had performed it: for, by the
fundamental laws of the realm, it is capital in any person, of what
quality soever, to make water within the precincts of the palace.
But I was a little comforted by a message from his majesty, "that
he would give orders to the grand justiciary for passing my pardon
in form:" which, however, I could not obtain; and I was privately
assured, "that the empress, conceiving the greatest abhorrence of
what I had done, removed to the most distant side of the court,
firmly resolved that those buildings should never be repaired for
her use: and, in the presence of her chief confidents could not
forbear vowing revenge."..
[Of the inhabitants of Lilliput; their learning, laws, and customs;
the manner of educating their children. The author's way of living
in that country. His vindication of a great lady.]
Although I intend to leave the description of this empire to a
particular treatise, yet, in the mean time, I am content to gratify
the curious reader with some general ideas. As the common size
of the natives is somewhat under six inches high, so there is an
exact proportion in all other animals, as well as plants and trees:
for instance, the tallest horses and oxen are between four and five
inches in height, the sheep an inch and half, more or less: their
geese about the bigness of a sparrow, and so the several gradations
downwards till you come to the smallest, which to my sight, were
almost invisible; but nature has adapted the eyes of the
Lilliputians to all objects proper for their view: they see with great
exactness, but at no great distance. And, to show the sharpness of
their sight towards objects that are near, I have been much pleased
with observing a cook pulling a lark, which was not so large as a
common fly; and a young girl threading an invisible needle with
invisible silk. Their tallest trees are about seven feet high: I mean
some of those in the great royal park, the tops whereof I could but
just reach with my fist clenched. The other vegetables are in the
same proportion; but this I leave to the reader's imagination..
I shall say but little at present of their learning, which, for many
ages, has flourished in all its branches among them: but their
manner of writing is very peculiar, being neither from the left to
the right, like the Europeans, nor from the right to the left, like the
Arabians, nor from up to down, like the Chinese, but aslant, from
one corner of the paper to the other, like ladies in England.
They bury their dead with their heads directly downward, because
they hold an opinion, that in eleven thousand moons they are all to
rise again; in which period the earth (which they conceive to be
flat) will turn upside down, and by this means they shall, at their
resurrection, be found ready standing on their feet. The learned
among them confess the absurdity of this doctrine; but the
practice still continues, in compliance to the vulgar.
There are some laws and customs in this empire very peculiar;
and if they were not so directly contrary to those of my own dear
country, I should be tempted to say a little in their justification. It
is only to be wished they were as well executed. The first I shall
mention, relates to informers. All crimes against the state, are
punished here with the utmost severity; but, if the person accused
makes his innocence plainly to appear upon his trial, the accuser is
immediately put to an ignominious death; and out of his goods or
lands the innocent person is quadruply recompensed for the loss
of his time, for the danger he underwent, for the hardship of his
imprisonment, and for all the charges he has been at in making his
defence; or, if that fund be deficient, it is largely supplied by the.
crown. The emperor also confers on him some public mark of his
favour, and proclamation is made of his innocence through the
whole city.
They look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore
seldom fail to punish it with death; for they allege, that care and
vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a
man's goods from thieves, but honesty has no defence against
superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there should be a
perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon
credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to
punish it, the honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets
the advantage. I remember, when I was once interceding with the
emperor for a criminal who had wronged his master of a great
sum of money, which he had received by order and ran away with;
and happening to tell his majesty, by way of extenuation, that it
was only a breach of trust, the emperor thought it monstrous in me
to offer as a defence the greatest aggravation of the crime; and
truly I had little to say in return, farther than the common answer,
that different nations had different customs; for, I confess, I was
heartily ashamed. (2)
Although we usually call reward and punishment the two hinges
upon which all government turns, yet I could never observe this
maxim to be put in practice by any nation except that of Lilliput.
Whoever can there bring sufficient proof, that he has strictly
observed the laws of his country for seventy-three moons, has a
claim to certain privileges, according to his quality or condition of
life, with a proportionable sum of money out of a fund.
appropriated for that use: he likewise acquires the title of
SNILPALL, or legal, which is added to his name, but does not
descend to his posterity. And these people thought it a prodigious
defect of policy among us, when I told them that our laws were
enforced only by penalties, without any mention of reward. It is
upon this account that the image of Justice, in their courts of
judicature, is formed with six eyes, two before, as many behind,
and on each side one, to signify circumspection; with a bag of
gold open in her right hand, and a sword sheathed in her left, to
show she is more disposed to reward than to punish.
In choosing persons for all employments, they have more regard
to good morals than to great abilities; for, since government is
necessary to mankind, they believe, that the common size of
human understanding is fitted to some station or other; and that
Providence never intended to make the management of public
affairs a mystery to be comprehended only by a few persons of
sublime genius, of which there seldom are three born in an age:
but they suppose truth, justice, temperance, and the like, to be in
every man's power; the practice of which virtues, assisted by
experience and a good intention, would qualify any man for the
service of his country, except where a course of study is required.
But they thought the want of moral virtues was so far from being
supplied by superior endowments of the mind, that employments
could never be put into such dangerous hands as those of persons
so qualified; and, at least, that the mistakes committed by
ignorance, in a virtuous disposition, would never be of such fatal.
consequence to the public weal, as the practices of a man, whose
inclinations led him to be corrupt, and who had great abilities to
manage, to multiply, and defend his corruptions.
In like manner, the disbelief of a Divine Providence renders a man
incapable of holding any public station; for, since kings avow
themselves to be the deputies of Providence, the Lilliputians think
nothing can be more absurd than for a prince to employ such men
as disown the authority under which he acts.
In relating these and the following laws, I would only be
understood to mean the original institutions, and not the most
scandalous corruptions, into which these people are fallen by the
degenerate nature of man. For, as to that infamous practice of
acquiring great employments by dancing on the ropes, or badges
of favour and distinction by leaping over sticks and creeping
under them, the reader is to observe, that they were first
introduced by the grandfather of the emperor now reigning, and
grew to the present height by the gradual increase of party and
faction.
Ingratitude is among them a capital crime, as we read it to have
been in some other countries: for they reason thus; that whoever
makes ill returns to his benefactor, must needs be a common
enemy to the rest of mankind, from whom he has received no
obligation, and therefore such a man is not fit to live..
Their notions relating to the duties of parents and children differ
extremely from ours. For, since the conjunction of male and
female is founded upon the great law of nature, in order to
propagate and continue the species, the Lilliputians will needs
have it, that men and women are joined together, like other
animals, by the motives of concupiscence; and that their
tenderness towards their young proceeds from the like natural
principle: for which reason they will never allow that a child is
under any obligation to his father for begetting him, or to his
mother for bringing him into the world; which, considering the
miseries of human life, was neither a benefit in itself, nor intended
so by his parents, whose thoughts, in their love encounters, were
otherwise employed. Upon these, and the like reasonings, their
opinion is, that parents are the last of all others to be trusted with
the education of their own children; and therefore they have in
every town public nurseries, where all parents, except cottagers
and labourers, are obliged to send their infants of both sexes to be
reared and educated, when they come to the age of twenty moons,
at which time they are supposed to have some rudiments of
docility. These schools are of several kinds, suited to different
qualities, and both sexes. They have certain professors well
skilled in preparing children for such a condition of life as befits
the rank of their parents, and their own capacities, as well as
inclinations. I shall first say something of the male nurseries, and
then of the female.
The nurseries for males of noble or eminent birth, are provided
with grave and learned professors, and their several deputies. The
clothes and food of the children are plain and simple. They are.
bred up in the principles of honour, justice, courage, modesty,
clemency, religion, and love of their country; they are always
employed in some business, except in the times of eating and
sleeping, which are very short, and two hours for diversions
consisting of bodily exercises. They are dressed by men till four
years of age, and then are obliged to dress themselves, although
their quality be ever so great; and the women attendant, who are
aged proportionably to ours at fifty, perform only the most menial
offices. They are never suffered to converse with servants, but go
together in smaller or greater numbers to take their diversions, and
always in the presence of a professor, or one of his deputies;
whereby they avoid those early bad impressions of folly and vice,
to which our children are subject.
Their parents are suffered to see them only twice a year; the visit
is to last but an hour; they are allowed to kiss the child at meeting
and parting; but a professor, who always stands by on those
occasions, will not suffer them to whisper, or use any fondling
expressions, or bring any presents of toys, sweetmeats, and the
like.
The pension from each family for the education and entertainment
of a child, upon failure of due payment, is levied by the emperor's
officers.
The nurseries for children of ordinary gentlemen, merchants,
traders, and handicrafts, are managed proportionably after the
same manner; only those designed for trades are put out
apprentices at eleven years old, whereas those of persons of.
quality continue in their exercises till fifteen, which answers to
twenty-one with us: but the confinement is gradually lessened for
the last three years.
In the female nurseries, the young girls of quality are educated
much like the males, only they are dressed by orderly servants of
their own sex; but always in the presence of a professor or deputy,
till they come to dress themselves, which is at five years old. And
if it be found that these nurses ever presume to entertain the girls
with frightful or foolish stories, or the common follies practised
by chambermaids among us, they are publicly whipped thrice
about the city, imprisoned for a year, and banished for life to the
most desolate part of the country. Thus the young ladies are as
much ashamed of being cowards and fools as the men, and
despise all personal ornaments, beyond decency and cleanliness:
neither did I perceive any difference in their education made by
their difference of sex, only that the exercises of the females were
not altogether so robust; and that some rules were given them
relating to domestic life, and a smaller compass of learning was
enjoined them: for their maxim is, that among peoples of quality,
a wife should be always a reasonable and agreeable companion,
because she cannot always be young. When the girls are twelve
years old, which among them is the marriageable age, their
parents or guardians take them home, with great expressions of
gratitude to the professors, and seldom without tears of the young
lady and her companions..
In the nurseries of females of the meaner sort, the children are
instructed in all kinds of works proper for their sex, and their
several degrees: those intended for apprentices are dismissed at
seven years old, the rest are kept to eleven.
The meaner families who have children at these nurseries, are
obliged, besides their annual pension, which is as low as possible,
to return to the steward of the nursery a small monthly share of
their gettings, to be a portion for the child; and therefore all
parents are limited in their expenses by the law. For the
Lilliputians think nothing can be more unjust, than for people, in
subservience to their own appetites, to bring children into the
world, and leave the burthen of supporting them on the public. As
to persons of quality, they give security to appropriate a certain
sum for each child, suitable to their condition; and these funds are
always managed with good husbandry and the most exact justice.
The cottagers and labourers keep their children at home, their
business being only to till and cultivate the earth, and therefore
their education is of little consequence to the public:
but the old and diseased among them, are supported by hospitals;
for begging is a trade unknown in this empire.
And here it may, perhaps, divert the curious reader, to give some
account of my domestics, and my manner of living in this country,
during a residence of nine months, and thirteen days. Having a
head mechanically turned, and being likewise forced by necessity,
I had made for myself a table and chair convenient enough, out of.
the largest trees in the royal park. Two hundred sempstresses were
employed to make me shirts, and linen for my bed and table, all of
the strongest and coarsest kind they could get; which, however,
they were forced to quilt together in several folds, for the thickest
was some degrees finer than lawn. Their linen is usually three
inches wide, and three feet make a piece. The sempstresses took
my measure as I lay on the ground, one standing at my neck, and
another at my mid-leg, with a strong cord extended, that each held
by the end, while a third measured the length of the cord with a
rule of an inch long. Then they measured my right thumb, and
desired no more; for by a mathematical computation, that twice
round the thumb is once round the wrist, and so on to the neck and
the waist, and by the help of my old shirt, which I displayed on the
ground before them for a pattern, they fitted me exactly. Three
hundred tailors were employed in the same manner to make me
clothes; but they had another contrivance for taking my measure. I
kneeled down, and they raised a ladder from the ground to my
neck; upon this ladder one of them mounted, and let fall a plumb-line
from my collar to the floor, which just answered the length of
my coat: but my waist and arms I measured myself. When my
clothes were finished, which was done in my house (for the
largest of theirs would not have been able to hold them), they
looked like the patch-work made by the ladies in England, only
that mine were all of a colour.
I had three hundred cooks to dress my victuals, in little convenient
huts built about my house, where they and their families lived,
and prepared me two dishes a-piece. I took up twenty waiters in
my hand, and placed them on the table: a hundred more attended.
below on the ground, some with dishes of meat, and some with
barrels of wine and other liquors slung on their shoulders; all
which the waiters above drew up, as I wanted, in a very ingenious
manner, by certain cords, as we draw the bucket up a well in
Europe. A dish of their meat was a good mouthful, and a barrel of
their liquor a reasonable draught. Their mutton yields to ours, but
their beef is excellent. I have had a sirloin so large, that I have
been forced to make three bites of it; but this is rare. My servants
were astonished to see me eat it, bones and all, as in our country
we do the leg of a lark. Their geese and turkeys I usually ate at a
mouthful, and I confess they far exceed ours. Of their smaller
fowl I could take up twenty or thirty at the end of my knife.
One day his imperial majesty, being informed of my way of
living, desired "that himself and his royal consort, with the young
princes of the blood of both sexes, might have the happiness," as
he was pleased to call it, "of dining with me." They came
accordingly, and I placed them in chairs of state, upon my table,
just over against me, with their guards about them. Flimnap, the
lord high treasurer, attended there likewise with his white staff;
and I observed he often looked on me with a sour countenance,
which I would not seem to regard, but ate more than usual, in
honour to my dear country, as well as to fill the court with
admiration. I have some private reasons to believe, that this visit
from his majesty gave Flimnap an opportunity of doing me ill
offices to his master. That minister had always been my secret
enemy, though he outwardly caressed me more than was usual to
the moroseness of his nature. He represented to the emperor "the
low condition of his treasury; that he was forced to take up money.
at a great discount; that exchequer bills would not circulate under
nine per cent. below par; that I had cost his majesty above a
million and a half of SPRUGS" (their greatest gold coin, about the
bigness of a spangle) "and, upon the whole, that it would be
advisable in the emperor to take the first fair occasion of
dismissing me."
I am here obliged to vindicate the reputation of an excellent lady,
who was an innocent sufferer upon my account. The treasurer
took a fancy to be jealous of his wife, from the malice of some
evil tongues, who informed him that her grace had taken a violent
affection for my person; and the court scandal ran for some time,
that she once came privately to my lodging. This I solemnly
declare to be a most infamous falsehood, without any grounds,
further than that her grace was pleased to treat me with all
innocent marks of freedom and friendship. I own she came often
to my house, but always publicly, nor ever without three more in
the coach, who were usually her sister and young daughter, and
some particular acquaintance; but this was common to many other
ladies of the court. And I still appeal to my servants round,
whether they at any time saw a coach at my door, without
knowing what persons were in it. On those occasions, when a
servant had given me notice, my custom was to go immediately to
the door, and, after paying my respects, to take up the coach and
two horses very carefully in my hands (for, if there were six
horses, the postillion always unharnessed four,) and place them on
a table, where I had fixed a movable rim quite round, of five
inches high, to prevent accidents. And I have often had four
coaches and horses at once on my table, full of company, while I.
sat in my chair, leaning my face towards them; and when I was
engaged with one set, the coachmen would gently drive the others
round my table. I have passed many an afternoon very agreeably
in these conversations. But I defy the treasurer, or his two
informers (I will name them, and let them make the best of it)
Clustril and Drunlo, to prove that any person ever came to me
INCOGNITO, except the secretary Reldresal, who was sent by
express command of his imperial majesty, as I have before related.
I should not have dwelt so long upon this particular, if it had not
been a point wherein the reputation of a great lady is so nearly
concerned, to say nothing of my own; though I then had the
honour to be a NARDAC, which the treasurer himself is not; for
all the world knows, that he is only a GLUMGLUM, a title
inferior by one degree, as that of a marquis is to a duke in
England; yet I allow he preceded me in right of his post. These
false informations, which I afterwards came to the knowledge of
by an accident not proper to mention, made the treasurer show his
lady for some time an ill countenance, and me a worse; and
although he was at last undeceived and reconciled to her, yet I lost
all credit with him, and found my interest decline very fast with
the emperor himself, who was, indeed, too much governed by that
favourite..
[The author, being informed of a design to accuse him of high-treason,
makes his escape to Blefuscu. His reception there.]
Before I proceed to give an account of my leaving this kingdom, it
may be proper to inform the reader of a private intrigue which had
been for two months forming against me.
I had been hitherto, all my life, a stranger to courts, for which I
was unqualified by the meanness of my condition. I had indeed
heard and read enough of the dispositions of great princes and
ministers, but never expected to have found such terrible effects
of them, in so remote a country, governed, as I thought, by very
different maxims from those in Europe.
When I was just preparing to pay my attendance on the emperor
of Blefuscu, a considerable person at court (to whom I had been
very serviceable, at a time when he lay under the highest
displeasure of his imperial majesty) came to my house very
privately at night, in a close chair, and, without sending his name,
desired admittance. The chairmen were dismissed; I put the chair,
with his lordship in it, into my coat-pocket: and, giving orders to a
trusty servant, to say I was indisposed and gone to sleep, I
fastened the door of my house, placed the chair on the table,.
according to my usual custom, and sat down by it. After the
common salutations were over, observing his lordship's
countenance full of concern, and inquiring into the reason, he
desired "I would hear him with patience, in a matter that highly
concerned my honour and my life." His speech was to the
following effect, for I took notes of it as soon as he left me:-"
You are to know," said he, "that several committees of council
have been lately called, in the most private manner, on your
account; and it is but two days since his majesty came to a full
resolution.
"You are very sensible that Skyresh Bolgolam" (GALBET, or
high-admiral) "has been your mortal enemy, almost ever since
your arrival. His original reasons I know not; but his hatred is
increased since your great success against Blefuscu, by which his
glory as admiral is much obscured. This lord, in conjunction with
Flimnap the high-treasurer, whose enmity against you is notorious
on account of his lady, Limtoc the general, Lalcon the
chamberlain, and Balmuff the grand justiciary, have prepared
articles of impeachment against you, for treason and other capital
crimes."
This preface made me so impatient, being conscious of my own
merits and innocence, that I was going to interrupt him; when he
entreated me to be silent, and thus proceeded:--.
"Out of gratitude for the favours you have done me, I procured
information of the whole proceedings, and a copy of the articles;
wherein I venture my head for your service.
"'Articles of Impeachment against QUINBUS FLESTRIN, (the
Man-Mountain.)
"'Whereas, by a statute made in the reign of his imperial majesty
Calin Deffar Plune, it is enacted, that, whoever shall make water
within the precincts of the royal palace, shall be liable to the pains
and penalties of high-treason; notwithstanding, the said Quinbus
Flestrin, in open breach of the said law, under colour of
extinguishing the fire kindled in the apartment of his majesty's
most dear imperial consort, did maliciously, traitorously, and
devilishly, by discharge of his urine, put out the said fire kindled
in the said apartment, lying and being within the precincts of the
said royal palace, against the statute in that case provided, etc.
against the duty, etc.
"'That the said Quinbus Flestrin, having brought the imperial fleet
of Blefuscu into the royal port, and being afterwards commanded
by his imperial majesty to seize all the other ships of the said
empire of Blefuscu, and reduce that empire to a province, to be
governed by a viceroy from hence, and to destroy and put to
death, not only all the Big-endian exiles, but likewise all the.
people of that empire who would not immediately forsake the
Big-endian heresy, he, the said Flestrin, like a false traitor against
his most auspicious, serene, imperial majesty, did petition to be
excused from the said service, upon pretence of unwillingness to
force the consciences, or destroy the liberties and lives of an
innocent people.
"'That, whereas certain ambassadors arrived from the Court of
Blefuscu, to sue for peace in his majesty's court, he, the said
Flestrin, did, like a false traitor, aid, abet, comfort, and divert, the
said ambassadors, although he knew them to be servants to a
prince who was lately an open enemy to his imperial majesty, and
in an open war against his said majesty.
"'That the said Quinbus Flestrin, contrary to the duty of a faithful
subject, is now preparing to make a voyage to the court and
empire of Blefuscu, for which he has received only verbal license
from his imperial majesty; and, under colour of the said license,
does falsely and traitorously intend to take the said voyage, and
thereby to aid, comfort, and abet the emperor of Blefuscu, so
lately an enemy, and in open war with his imperial majesty
aforesaid.'
"There are some other articles; but these are the most important,
of which I have read you an abstract..
"In the several debates upon this impeachment, it must be
confessed that his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity;
often urging the services you had done him, and endeavouring to
extenuate your crimes. The treasurer and admiral insisted that you
should be put to the most painful and ignominious death, by
setting fire to your house at night, and the general was to attend
with twenty thousand men, armed with poisoned arrows, to shoot
you on the face and hands. Some of your servants were to have
private orders to strew a poisonous juice on your shirts and sheets,
which would soon make you tear your own flesh, and die in the
utmost torture. The general came into the same opinion; so that
for a long time there was a majority against you; but his majesty
resolving, if possible, to spare your life, at last brought off the
chamberlain.
"Upon this incident, Reldresal, principal secretary for private
affairs, who always approved himself your true friend, was
commanded by the emperor to deliver his opinion, which he
accordingly did; and therein justified the good thoughts you have
of him. He allowed your crimes to be great, but that still there was
room for mercy, the most commendable virtue in a prince, and for
which his majesty was so justly celebrated. He said, the friendship
between you and him was so well known to the world, that
perhaps the most honourable board might think him partial;
however, in obedience to the command he had received, he would
freely offer his sentiments. That if his majesty, in consideration of
your services, and pursuant to his own merciful disposition,
would please to spare your life, and only give orders to put out.
both your eyes, he humbly conceived, that by this expedient
justice might in some measure be satisfied, and all the world
would applaud the lenity of the emperor, as well as the fair and
generous proceedings of those who have the honour to be his
counsellors. That the loss of your eyes would be no impediment to
your bodily strength, by which you might still be useful to his
majesty; that blindness is an addition to courage, by concealing
dangers from us; that the fear you had for your eyes, was the
greatest difficulty in bringing over the enemy's fleet, and it would
be sufficient for you to see by the eyes of the ministers, since the
greatest princes do no more.
"This proposal was received with the utmost disapprobation by
the whole board. Bolgolam, the admiral, could not preserve his
temper, but, rising up in fury, said, he wondered how the secretary
durst presume to give his opinion for preserving the life of a
traitor; that the services you had performed were, by all true
reasons of state, the great aggravation of your crimes; that you,
who were able to extinguish the fire by discharge of urine in her
majesty's apartment (which he mentioned with horror), might, at
another time, raise an inundation by the same means, to drown the
whole palace; and the same strength which enabled you to bring
over the enemy's fleet, might serve, upon the first discontent, to
carry it back; that he had good reasons to think you were a Big-endian
in your heart; and, as treason begins in the heart, before it
appears in overt-acts, so he accused you as a traitor on that
account, and therefore insisted you should be put to death..
"The treasurer was of the same opinion: he showed to what straits
his majesty's revenue was reduced, by the charge of maintaining
you, which would soon grow insupportable; that the secretary's
expedient of putting out your eyes, was so far from being a
remedy against this evil, that it would probably increase it, as is
manifest from the common practice of blinding some kind of
fowls, after which they fed the faster, and grew sooner fat; that his
sacred majesty and the council, who are your judges, were, in
their own consciences, fully convinced of your guilt, which was a
sufficient argument to condemn you to death, without the formal
proofs required by the strict letter of the law.
"But his imperial majesty, fully determined against capital
punishment, was graciously pleased to say, that since the council
thought the loss of your eyes too easy a censure, some other way
may be inflicted hereafter. And your friend the secretary, humbly
desiring to be heard again, in answer to what the treasurer had
objected, concerning the great charge his majesty was at in
maintaining you, said, that his excellency, who had the sole
disposal of the emperor's revenue, might easily provide against
that evil, by gradually lessening your establishment; by which, for
want of sufficient for you would grow weak and faint, and lose
your appetite, and consequently, decay, and consume in a few
months; neither would the stench of your carcass be then so
dangerous, when it should become more than half diminished; and
immediately upon your death five or six thousand of his majesty's
subjects might, in two or three days, cut your flesh from your.
bones, take it away by cart-loads, and bury it in distant parts, to
prevent infection, leaving the skeleton as a monument of
admiration to posterity.
"Thus, by the great friendship of the secretary, the whole affair
was compromised. It was strictly enjoined, that the project of
starving you by degrees should be kept a secret; but the sentence
of putting out your eyes was entered on the books; none
dissenting, except Bolgolam the admiral, who, being a creature of
the empress, was perpetually instigated by her majesty to insist
upon your death, she having borne perpetual malice against you,
on account of that infamous and illegal method you took to
extinguish the fire in her apartment.
"In three days your friend the secretary will be directed to come to
your house, and read before you the articles of impeachment; and
then to signify the great lenity and favour of his majesty and
council, whereby you are only condemned to the loss of your
eyes, which his majesty does not question you will gratefully and
humbly submit to; and twenty of his majesty's surgeons will
attend, in order to see the operation well performed, by
discharging very sharp-pointed arrows into the balls of your eyes,
as you lie on the ground.
"I leave to your prudence what measures you will take; and to
avoid suspicion, I must immediately return in as private a manner
as I came.".
His lordship did so; and I remained alone, under many doubts and
perplexities of mind.
It was a custom introduced by this prince and his ministry (very
different, as I have been assured, from the practice of former
times,) that after the court had decreed any cruel execution, either
to gratify the monarch's resentment, or the malice of a favourite,
the emperor always made a speech to his whole council,
expressing his great lenity and tenderness, as qualities known and
confessed by all the world. This speech was immediately
published throughout the kingdom; nor did any thing terrify the
people so much as those encomiums on his majesty's mercy;
because it was observed, that the more these praises were enlarged
and insisted on, the more inhuman was the punishment, and the
sufferer more innocent. Yet, as to myself, I must confess, having
never been designed for a courtier, either by my birth or
education, I was so ill a judge of things, that I could not discover
the lenity and favour of this sentence, but conceived it (perhaps
erroneously) rather to be rigorous than gentle. I sometimes
thought of standing my trial, for, although I could not deny the
facts alleged in the several articles, yet I hoped they would admit
of some extenuation. But having in my life perused many state-trials,
which I ever observed to terminate as the judges thought fit
to direct, I durst not rely on so dangerous a decision, in so critical
a juncture, and against such powerful enemies. Once I was
strongly bent upon resistance, for, while I had liberty the whole
strength of that empire could hardly subdue me, and I might easily
with stones pelt the metropolis to pieces; but I soon rejected that
project with horror, by remembering the oath I had made to the.
emperor, the favours I received from him, and the high title of
NARDAC he conferred upon me. Neither had I so soon learned
the gratitude of courtiers, to persuade myself, that his majesty's
present seventies acquitted me of all past obligations.
At last, I fixed upon a resolution, for which it is probable I may
incur some censure, and not unjustly; for I confess I owe the
preserving of mine eyes, and consequently my liberty, to my own
great rashness and want of experience; because, if I had then
known the nature of princes and ministers, which I have since
observed in many other courts, and their methods of treating
criminals less obnoxious than myself, I should, with great alacrity
and readiness, have submitted to so easy a punishment. But
hurried on by the precipitancy of youth, and having his imperial
majesty's license to pay my attendance upon the emperor of
Blefuscu, I took this opportunity, before the three days were
elapsed, to send a letter to my friend the secretary, signifying my
resolution of setting out that morning for Blefuscu, pursuant to the
leave I had got; and, without waiting for an answer, I went to that
side of the island where our fleet lay. I seized a large man of war,
tied a cable to the prow, and, lifting up the anchors, I stripped
myself, put my clothes (together with my coverlet, which I carried
under my arm) into the vessel, and, drawing it after me, between
wading and swimming arrived at the royal port of Blefuscu, where
the people had long expected me: they lent me two guides to
direct me to the capital city, which is of the same name. I held
them in my hands, till I came within two hundred yards of the
gate, and desired them "to signify my arrival to one of the
secretaries, and let him know, I there waited his majesty's.
command." I had an answer in about an hour, "that his majesty,
attended by the royal family, and great officers of the court, was
coming out to receive me." I advanced a hundred yards. The
emperor and his train alighted from their horses, the empress and
ladies from their coaches, and I did not perceive they were in any
fright or concern. I lay on the ground to kiss his majesty's and the
empress's hands. I told his majesty, "that I was come according to
my promise, and with the license of the emperor my master, to
have the honour of seeing so mighty a monarch, and to offer him
any service in my power, consistent with my duty to my own
prince;" not mentioning a word of my disgrace, because I had
hitherto no regular information of it, and might suppose myself
wholly ignorant of any such design; neither could I reasonably
conceive that the emperor would discover the secret, while I was
out of his power; wherein, however, it soon appeared I was
deceived.
I shall not trouble the reader with the particular account of my
reception at this court, which was suitable to the generosity of so
great a prince; nor of the difficulties I was in for want of a house
and bed, being forced to lie on the ground, wrapped up in my
coverlet..
[The author, by a lucky accident, finds means to leave Blefuscu;
and, after some difficulties, returns safe to his native country.]
Three days after my arrival, walking out of curiosity to the north-east
coast of the island, I observed, about half a league off in the
sea, somewhat that looked like a boat overturned. I pulled off my
shoes and stockings, and, wailing two or three hundred yards, I
found the object to approach nearer by force of the tide; and then
plainly saw it to be a real boat, which I supposed might by some
tempest have been driven from a ship. Whereupon, I returned
immediately towards the city, and desired his imperial majesty to
lend me twenty of the tallest vessels he had left, after the loss of
his fleet, and three thousand seamen, under the command of his
vice-admiral. This fleet sailed round, while I went back the
shortest way to the coast, where I first discovered the boat. I found
the tide had driven it still nearer. The seamen were all provided
with cordage, which I had beforehand twisted to a sufficient
strength. When the ships came up, I stripped myself, and waded
till I came within a hundred yards off the boat, after which I was
forced to swim till I got up to it. The seamen threw me the end of
the cord, which I fastened to a hole in the fore-part of the boat,
and the other end to a man of war; but I found all my labour to
little purpose; for, being out of my depth, I was not able to work..
In this necessity I was forced to swim behind, and push the boat
forward, as often as I could, with one of my hands; and the tide
favouring me, I advanced so far that I could just hold up my chin
and feel the ground. I rested two or three minutes, and then gave
the boat another shove, and so on, till the sea was no higher than
my arm-pits; and now, the most laborious part being over, I took
out my other cables, which were stowed in one of the ships, and
fastened them first to the boat, and then to nine of the vessels
which attended me; the wind being favourable, the seamen towed,
and I shoved, until we arrived within forty yards of the shore; and,
waiting till the tide was out, I got dry to the boat, and by the
assistance of two thousand men, with ropes and engines, I made a
shift to turn it on its bottom, and found it was but little damaged.
I shall not trouble the reader with the difficulties I was under, by
the help of certain paddles, which cost me ten days making, to get
my boat to the royal port of Blefuscu, where a mighty concourse
of people appeared upon my arrival, full of wonder at the sight of
so prodigious a vessel. I told the emperor "that my good fortune
had thrown this boat in my way, to carry me to some place whence
I might return into my native country; and begged his majesty's
orders for getting materials to fit it up, together with his license to
depart;" which, after some kind expostulations, he was pleased to
grant.
I did very much wonder, in all this time, not to have heard of any
express relating to me from our emperor to the court of Blefuscu.
But I was afterward given privately to understand, that his
imperial majesty, never imagining I had the least notice of his.
designs, believed I was only gone to Blefuscu in performance of
my promise, according to the license he had given me, which was
well known at our court, and would return in a few days, when the
ceremony was ended. But he was at last in pain at my long
absence; and after consulting with the treasurer and the rest of that
cabal, a person of quality was dispatched with the copy of the
articles against me. This envoy had instructions to represent to the
monarch of Blefuscu, "the great lenity of his master, who was
content to punish me no farther than with the loss of mine eyes;
that I had fled from justice; and if I did not return in two hours, I
should be deprived of my title of NARDAC, and declared a
traitor." The envoy further added, "that in order to maintain the
peace and amity between both empires, his master expected that
his brother of Blefuscu would give orders to have me sent back to
Lilliput, bound hand and foot, to be punished as a traitor."
The emperor of Blefuscu, having taken three days to consult,
returned an answer consisting of many civilities and excuses. He
said, "that as for sending me bound, his brother knew it was
impossible; that, although I had deprived him of his fleet, yet he
owed great obligations to me for many good offices I had done
him in making the peace. That, however, both their majesties
would soon be made easy; for I had found a prodigious vessel on
the shore, able to carry me on the sea, which he had given orders
to fit up, with my own assistance and direction; and he hoped, in a
few weeks, both empires would be freed from so insupportable an
encumbrance.".
With this answer the envoy returned to Lilliput; and the monarch
of Blefuscu related to me all that had passed; offering me at the
same time (but under the strictest confidence) his gracious
protection, if I would continue in his service; wherein, although I
believed him sincere, yet I resolved never more to put any
confidence in princes or ministers, where I could possibly avoid
it; and therefore, with all due acknowledgments for his favourable
intentions, I humbly begged to be excused. I told him, "that since
fortune, whether good or evil, had thrown a vessel in my way, I
was resolved to venture myself on the ocean, rather than be an
occasion of difference between two such mighty monarchs."
Neither did I find the emperor at all displeased; and I discovered,
by a certain accident, that he was very glad of my resolution, and
so were most of his ministers.
These considerations moved me to hasten my departure somewhat
sooner than I intended; to which the court, impatient to have me
gone, very readily contributed. Five hundred workmen were
employed to make two sails to my boat, according to my
directions, by quilting thirteen folds of their strongest linen
together. I was at the pains of making ropes and cables, by
twisting ten, twenty, or thirty of the thickest and strongest of
theirs. A great stone that I happened to find, after a long search, by
the sea-shore, served me for an anchor. I had the tallow of three
hundred cows, for greasing my boat, and other uses. I was at
incredible pains in cutting down some of the largest timber-trees,
for oars and masts, wherein I was, however, much assisted by his
majesty's ship-carpenters, who helped me in smoothing them,
after I had done the rough work..
In about a month, when all was prepared, I sent to receive his
majesty's commands, and to take my leave. The emperor and
royal family came out of the palace; I lay down on my face to kiss
his hand, which he very graciously gave me: so did the empress
and young princes of the blood. His majesty presented me with
fifty purses of two hundred SPRUGS a-piece, together with his
picture at full length, which I put immediately into one of my
gloves, to keep it from being hurt. The ceremonies at my
departure were too many to trouble the reader with at this time.
I stored the boat with the carcases of a hundred oxen, and three
hundred sheep, with bread and drink proportionable, and as much
meat ready dressed as four hundred cooks could provide. I took
with me six cows and two bulls alive, with as many ewes and
rams, intending to carry them into my own country, and propagate
the breed. And to feed them on board, I had a good bundle of hay,
and a bag of corn. I would gladly have taken a dozen of the
natives, but this was a thing the emperor would by no means
permit; and, besides a diligent search into my pockets, his majesty
engaged my honour "not to carry away any of his subjects,
although with their own consent and desire."
Having thus prepared all things as well as I was able, I set sail on
the twenty-fourth day of September 1701, at six in the morning;
and when I had gone about four-leagues to the northward, the
wind being at south-east, at six in the evening I descried a small
island, about half a league to the north-west. I advanced forward,
fundamental laws of the realm, it is capital in any person, of what
quality soever, to make water within the precincts of the palace.
But I was a little comforted by a message from his majesty, "that
he would give orders to the grand justiciary for passing my pardon
in form:" which, however, I could not obtain; and I was privately
assured, "that the empress, conceiving the greatest abhorrence of
what I had done, removed to the most distant side of the court,
firmly resolved that those buildings should never be repaired for
her use: and, in the presence of her chief confidents could not
forbear vowing revenge."..
[Of the inhabitants of Lilliput; their learning, laws, and customs;
the manner of educating their children. The author's way of living
in that country. His vindication of a great lady.]
Although I intend to leave the description of this empire to a
particular treatise, yet, in the mean time, I am content to gratify
the curious reader with some general ideas. As the common size
of the natives is somewhat under six inches high, so there is an
exact proportion in all other animals, as well as plants and trees:
for instance, the tallest horses and oxen are between four and five
inches in height, the sheep an inch and half, more or less: their
geese about the bigness of a sparrow, and so the several gradations
downwards till you come to the smallest, which to my sight, were
almost invisible; but nature has adapted the eyes of the
Lilliputians to all objects proper for their view: they see with great
exactness, but at no great distance. And, to show the sharpness of
their sight towards objects that are near, I have been much pleased
with observing a cook pulling a lark, which was not so large as a
common fly; and a young girl threading an invisible needle with
invisible silk. Their tallest trees are about seven feet high: I mean
some of those in the great royal park, the tops whereof I could but
just reach with my fist clenched. The other vegetables are in the
same proportion; but this I leave to the reader's imagination..
I shall say but little at present of their learning, which, for many
ages, has flourished in all its branches among them: but their
manner of writing is very peculiar, being neither from the left to
the right, like the Europeans, nor from the right to the left, like the
Arabians, nor from up to down, like the Chinese, but aslant, from
one corner of the paper to the other, like ladies in England.
They bury their dead with their heads directly downward, because
they hold an opinion, that in eleven thousand moons they are all to
rise again; in which period the earth (which they conceive to be
flat) will turn upside down, and by this means they shall, at their
resurrection, be found ready standing on their feet. The learned
among them confess the absurdity of this doctrine; but the
practice still continues, in compliance to the vulgar.
There are some laws and customs in this empire very peculiar;
and if they were not so directly contrary to those of my own dear
country, I should be tempted to say a little in their justification. It
is only to be wished they were as well executed. The first I shall
mention, relates to informers. All crimes against the state, are
punished here with the utmost severity; but, if the person accused
makes his innocence plainly to appear upon his trial, the accuser is
immediately put to an ignominious death; and out of his goods or
lands the innocent person is quadruply recompensed for the loss
of his time, for the danger he underwent, for the hardship of his
imprisonment, and for all the charges he has been at in making his
defence; or, if that fund be deficient, it is largely supplied by the.
crown. The emperor also confers on him some public mark of his
favour, and proclamation is made of his innocence through the
whole city.
They look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore
seldom fail to punish it with death; for they allege, that care and
vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a
man's goods from thieves, but honesty has no defence against
superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there should be a
perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon
credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to
punish it, the honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets
the advantage. I remember, when I was once interceding with the
emperor for a criminal who had wronged his master of a great
sum of money, which he had received by order and ran away with;
and happening to tell his majesty, by way of extenuation, that it
was only a breach of trust, the emperor thought it monstrous in me
to offer as a defence the greatest aggravation of the crime; and
truly I had little to say in return, farther than the common answer,
that different nations had different customs; for, I confess, I was
heartily ashamed. (2)
Although we usually call reward and punishment the two hinges
upon which all government turns, yet I could never observe this
maxim to be put in practice by any nation except that of Lilliput.
Whoever can there bring sufficient proof, that he has strictly
observed the laws of his country for seventy-three moons, has a
claim to certain privileges, according to his quality or condition of
life, with a proportionable sum of money out of a fund.
appropriated for that use: he likewise acquires the title of
SNILPALL, or legal, which is added to his name, but does not
descend to his posterity. And these people thought it a prodigious
defect of policy among us, when I told them that our laws were
enforced only by penalties, without any mention of reward. It is
upon this account that the image of Justice, in their courts of
judicature, is formed with six eyes, two before, as many behind,
and on each side one, to signify circumspection; with a bag of
gold open in her right hand, and a sword sheathed in her left, to
show she is more disposed to reward than to punish.
In choosing persons for all employments, they have more regard
to good morals than to great abilities; for, since government is
necessary to mankind, they believe, that the common size of
human understanding is fitted to some station or other; and that
Providence never intended to make the management of public
affairs a mystery to be comprehended only by a few persons of
sublime genius, of which there seldom are three born in an age:
but they suppose truth, justice, temperance, and the like, to be in
every man's power; the practice of which virtues, assisted by
experience and a good intention, would qualify any man for the
service of his country, except where a course of study is required.
But they thought the want of moral virtues was so far from being
supplied by superior endowments of the mind, that employments
could never be put into such dangerous hands as those of persons
so qualified; and, at least, that the mistakes committed by
ignorance, in a virtuous disposition, would never be of such fatal.
consequence to the public weal, as the practices of a man, whose
inclinations led him to be corrupt, and who had great abilities to
manage, to multiply, and defend his corruptions.
In like manner, the disbelief of a Divine Providence renders a man
incapable of holding any public station; for, since kings avow
themselves to be the deputies of Providence, the Lilliputians think
nothing can be more absurd than for a prince to employ such men
as disown the authority under which he acts.
In relating these and the following laws, I would only be
understood to mean the original institutions, and not the most
scandalous corruptions, into which these people are fallen by the
degenerate nature of man. For, as to that infamous practice of
acquiring great employments by dancing on the ropes, or badges
of favour and distinction by leaping over sticks and creeping
under them, the reader is to observe, that they were first
introduced by the grandfather of the emperor now reigning, and
grew to the present height by the gradual increase of party and
faction.
Ingratitude is among them a capital crime, as we read it to have
been in some other countries: for they reason thus; that whoever
makes ill returns to his benefactor, must needs be a common
enemy to the rest of mankind, from whom he has received no
obligation, and therefore such a man is not fit to live..
Their notions relating to the duties of parents and children differ
extremely from ours. For, since the conjunction of male and
female is founded upon the great law of nature, in order to
propagate and continue the species, the Lilliputians will needs
have it, that men and women are joined together, like other
animals, by the motives of concupiscence; and that their
tenderness towards their young proceeds from the like natural
principle: for which reason they will never allow that a child is
under any obligation to his father for begetting him, or to his
mother for bringing him into the world; which, considering the
miseries of human life, was neither a benefit in itself, nor intended
so by his parents, whose thoughts, in their love encounters, were
otherwise employed. Upon these, and the like reasonings, their
opinion is, that parents are the last of all others to be trusted with
the education of their own children; and therefore they have in
every town public nurseries, where all parents, except cottagers
and labourers, are obliged to send their infants of both sexes to be
reared and educated, when they come to the age of twenty moons,
at which time they are supposed to have some rudiments of
docility. These schools are of several kinds, suited to different
qualities, and both sexes. They have certain professors well
skilled in preparing children for such a condition of life as befits
the rank of their parents, and their own capacities, as well as
inclinations. I shall first say something of the male nurseries, and
then of the female.
The nurseries for males of noble or eminent birth, are provided
with grave and learned professors, and their several deputies. The
clothes and food of the children are plain and simple. They are.
bred up in the principles of honour, justice, courage, modesty,
clemency, religion, and love of their country; they are always
employed in some business, except in the times of eating and
sleeping, which are very short, and two hours for diversions
consisting of bodily exercises. They are dressed by men till four
years of age, and then are obliged to dress themselves, although
their quality be ever so great; and the women attendant, who are
aged proportionably to ours at fifty, perform only the most menial
offices. They are never suffered to converse with servants, but go
together in smaller or greater numbers to take their diversions, and
always in the presence of a professor, or one of his deputies;
whereby they avoid those early bad impressions of folly and vice,
to which our children are subject.
Their parents are suffered to see them only twice a year; the visit
is to last but an hour; they are allowed to kiss the child at meeting
and parting; but a professor, who always stands by on those
occasions, will not suffer them to whisper, or use any fondling
expressions, or bring any presents of toys, sweetmeats, and the
like.
The pension from each family for the education and entertainment
of a child, upon failure of due payment, is levied by the emperor's
officers.
The nurseries for children of ordinary gentlemen, merchants,
traders, and handicrafts, are managed proportionably after the
same manner; only those designed for trades are put out
apprentices at eleven years old, whereas those of persons of.
quality continue in their exercises till fifteen, which answers to
twenty-one with us: but the confinement is gradually lessened for
the last three years.
In the female nurseries, the young girls of quality are educated
much like the males, only they are dressed by orderly servants of
their own sex; but always in the presence of a professor or deputy,
till they come to dress themselves, which is at five years old. And
if it be found that these nurses ever presume to entertain the girls
with frightful or foolish stories, or the common follies practised
by chambermaids among us, they are publicly whipped thrice
about the city, imprisoned for a year, and banished for life to the
most desolate part of the country. Thus the young ladies are as
much ashamed of being cowards and fools as the men, and
despise all personal ornaments, beyond decency and cleanliness:
neither did I perceive any difference in their education made by
their difference of sex, only that the exercises of the females were
not altogether so robust; and that some rules were given them
relating to domestic life, and a smaller compass of learning was
enjoined them: for their maxim is, that among peoples of quality,
a wife should be always a reasonable and agreeable companion,
because she cannot always be young. When the girls are twelve
years old, which among them is the marriageable age, their
parents or guardians take them home, with great expressions of
gratitude to the professors, and seldom without tears of the young
lady and her companions..
In the nurseries of females of the meaner sort, the children are
instructed in all kinds of works proper for their sex, and their
several degrees: those intended for apprentices are dismissed at
seven years old, the rest are kept to eleven.
The meaner families who have children at these nurseries, are
obliged, besides their annual pension, which is as low as possible,
to return to the steward of the nursery a small monthly share of
their gettings, to be a portion for the child; and therefore all
parents are limited in their expenses by the law. For the
Lilliputians think nothing can be more unjust, than for people, in
subservience to their own appetites, to bring children into the
world, and leave the burthen of supporting them on the public. As
to persons of quality, they give security to appropriate a certain
sum for each child, suitable to their condition; and these funds are
always managed with good husbandry and the most exact justice.
The cottagers and labourers keep their children at home, their
business being only to till and cultivate the earth, and therefore
their education is of little consequence to the public:
but the old and diseased among them, are supported by hospitals;
for begging is a trade unknown in this empire.
And here it may, perhaps, divert the curious reader, to give some
account of my domestics, and my manner of living in this country,
during a residence of nine months, and thirteen days. Having a
head mechanically turned, and being likewise forced by necessity,
I had made for myself a table and chair convenient enough, out of.
the largest trees in the royal park. Two hundred sempstresses were
employed to make me shirts, and linen for my bed and table, all of
the strongest and coarsest kind they could get; which, however,
they were forced to quilt together in several folds, for the thickest
was some degrees finer than lawn. Their linen is usually three
inches wide, and three feet make a piece. The sempstresses took
my measure as I lay on the ground, one standing at my neck, and
another at my mid-leg, with a strong cord extended, that each held
by the end, while a third measured the length of the cord with a
rule of an inch long. Then they measured my right thumb, and
desired no more; for by a mathematical computation, that twice
round the thumb is once round the wrist, and so on to the neck and
the waist, and by the help of my old shirt, which I displayed on the
ground before them for a pattern, they fitted me exactly. Three
hundred tailors were employed in the same manner to make me
clothes; but they had another contrivance for taking my measure. I
kneeled down, and they raised a ladder from the ground to my
neck; upon this ladder one of them mounted, and let fall a plumb-line
from my collar to the floor, which just answered the length of
my coat: but my waist and arms I measured myself. When my
clothes were finished, which was done in my house (for the
largest of theirs would not have been able to hold them), they
looked like the patch-work made by the ladies in England, only
that mine were all of a colour.
I had three hundred cooks to dress my victuals, in little convenient
huts built about my house, where they and their families lived,
and prepared me two dishes a-piece. I took up twenty waiters in
my hand, and placed them on the table: a hundred more attended.
below on the ground, some with dishes of meat, and some with
barrels of wine and other liquors slung on their shoulders; all
which the waiters above drew up, as I wanted, in a very ingenious
manner, by certain cords, as we draw the bucket up a well in
Europe. A dish of their meat was a good mouthful, and a barrel of
their liquor a reasonable draught. Their mutton yields to ours, but
their beef is excellent. I have had a sirloin so large, that I have
been forced to make three bites of it; but this is rare. My servants
were astonished to see me eat it, bones and all, as in our country
we do the leg of a lark. Their geese and turkeys I usually ate at a
mouthful, and I confess they far exceed ours. Of their smaller
fowl I could take up twenty or thirty at the end of my knife.
One day his imperial majesty, being informed of my way of
living, desired "that himself and his royal consort, with the young
princes of the blood of both sexes, might have the happiness," as
he was pleased to call it, "of dining with me." They came
accordingly, and I placed them in chairs of state, upon my table,
just over against me, with their guards about them. Flimnap, the
lord high treasurer, attended there likewise with his white staff;
and I observed he often looked on me with a sour countenance,
which I would not seem to regard, but ate more than usual, in
honour to my dear country, as well as to fill the court with
admiration. I have some private reasons to believe, that this visit
from his majesty gave Flimnap an opportunity of doing me ill
offices to his master. That minister had always been my secret
enemy, though he outwardly caressed me more than was usual to
the moroseness of his nature. He represented to the emperor "the
low condition of his treasury; that he was forced to take up money.
at a great discount; that exchequer bills would not circulate under
nine per cent. below par; that I had cost his majesty above a
million and a half of SPRUGS" (their greatest gold coin, about the
bigness of a spangle) "and, upon the whole, that it would be
advisable in the emperor to take the first fair occasion of
dismissing me."
I am here obliged to vindicate the reputation of an excellent lady,
who was an innocent sufferer upon my account. The treasurer
took a fancy to be jealous of his wife, from the malice of some
evil tongues, who informed him that her grace had taken a violent
affection for my person; and the court scandal ran for some time,
that she once came privately to my lodging. This I solemnly
declare to be a most infamous falsehood, without any grounds,
further than that her grace was pleased to treat me with all
innocent marks of freedom and friendship. I own she came often
to my house, but always publicly, nor ever without three more in
the coach, who were usually her sister and young daughter, and
some particular acquaintance; but this was common to many other
ladies of the court. And I still appeal to my servants round,
whether they at any time saw a coach at my door, without
knowing what persons were in it. On those occasions, when a
servant had given me notice, my custom was to go immediately to
the door, and, after paying my respects, to take up the coach and
two horses very carefully in my hands (for, if there were six
horses, the postillion always unharnessed four,) and place them on
a table, where I had fixed a movable rim quite round, of five
inches high, to prevent accidents. And I have often had four
coaches and horses at once on my table, full of company, while I.
sat in my chair, leaning my face towards them; and when I was
engaged with one set, the coachmen would gently drive the others
round my table. I have passed many an afternoon very agreeably
in these conversations. But I defy the treasurer, or his two
informers (I will name them, and let them make the best of it)
Clustril and Drunlo, to prove that any person ever came to me
INCOGNITO, except the secretary Reldresal, who was sent by
express command of his imperial majesty, as I have before related.
I should not have dwelt so long upon this particular, if it had not
been a point wherein the reputation of a great lady is so nearly
concerned, to say nothing of my own; though I then had the
honour to be a NARDAC, which the treasurer himself is not; for
all the world knows, that he is only a GLUMGLUM, a title
inferior by one degree, as that of a marquis is to a duke in
England; yet I allow he preceded me in right of his post. These
false informations, which I afterwards came to the knowledge of
by an accident not proper to mention, made the treasurer show his
lady for some time an ill countenance, and me a worse; and
although he was at last undeceived and reconciled to her, yet I lost
all credit with him, and found my interest decline very fast with
the emperor himself, who was, indeed, too much governed by that
favourite..
[The author, being informed of a design to accuse him of high-treason,
makes his escape to Blefuscu. His reception there.]
Before I proceed to give an account of my leaving this kingdom, it
may be proper to inform the reader of a private intrigue which had
been for two months forming against me.
I had been hitherto, all my life, a stranger to courts, for which I
was unqualified by the meanness of my condition. I had indeed
heard and read enough of the dispositions of great princes and
ministers, but never expected to have found such terrible effects
of them, in so remote a country, governed, as I thought, by very
different maxims from those in Europe.
When I was just preparing to pay my attendance on the emperor
of Blefuscu, a considerable person at court (to whom I had been
very serviceable, at a time when he lay under the highest
displeasure of his imperial majesty) came to my house very
privately at night, in a close chair, and, without sending his name,
desired admittance. The chairmen were dismissed; I put the chair,
with his lordship in it, into my coat-pocket: and, giving orders to a
trusty servant, to say I was indisposed and gone to sleep, I
fastened the door of my house, placed the chair on the table,.
according to my usual custom, and sat down by it. After the
common salutations were over, observing his lordship's
countenance full of concern, and inquiring into the reason, he
desired "I would hear him with patience, in a matter that highly
concerned my honour and my life." His speech was to the
following effect, for I took notes of it as soon as he left me:-"
You are to know," said he, "that several committees of council
have been lately called, in the most private manner, on your
account; and it is but two days since his majesty came to a full
resolution.
"You are very sensible that Skyresh Bolgolam" (GALBET, or
high-admiral) "has been your mortal enemy, almost ever since
your arrival. His original reasons I know not; but his hatred is
increased since your great success against Blefuscu, by which his
glory as admiral is much obscured. This lord, in conjunction with
Flimnap the high-treasurer, whose enmity against you is notorious
on account of his lady, Limtoc the general, Lalcon the
chamberlain, and Balmuff the grand justiciary, have prepared
articles of impeachment against you, for treason and other capital
crimes."
This preface made me so impatient, being conscious of my own
merits and innocence, that I was going to interrupt him; when he
entreated me to be silent, and thus proceeded:--.
"Out of gratitude for the favours you have done me, I procured
information of the whole proceedings, and a copy of the articles;
wherein I venture my head for your service.
"'Articles of Impeachment against QUINBUS FLESTRIN, (the
Man-Mountain.)
"'Whereas, by a statute made in the reign of his imperial majesty
Calin Deffar Plune, it is enacted, that, whoever shall make water
within the precincts of the royal palace, shall be liable to the pains
and penalties of high-treason; notwithstanding, the said Quinbus
Flestrin, in open breach of the said law, under colour of
extinguishing the fire kindled in the apartment of his majesty's
most dear imperial consort, did maliciously, traitorously, and
devilishly, by discharge of his urine, put out the said fire kindled
in the said apartment, lying and being within the precincts of the
said royal palace, against the statute in that case provided, etc.
against the duty, etc.
"'That the said Quinbus Flestrin, having brought the imperial fleet
of Blefuscu into the royal port, and being afterwards commanded
by his imperial majesty to seize all the other ships of the said
empire of Blefuscu, and reduce that empire to a province, to be
governed by a viceroy from hence, and to destroy and put to
death, not only all the Big-endian exiles, but likewise all the.
people of that empire who would not immediately forsake the
Big-endian heresy, he, the said Flestrin, like a false traitor against
his most auspicious, serene, imperial majesty, did petition to be
excused from the said service, upon pretence of unwillingness to
force the consciences, or destroy the liberties and lives of an
innocent people.
"'That, whereas certain ambassadors arrived from the Court of
Blefuscu, to sue for peace in his majesty's court, he, the said
Flestrin, did, like a false traitor, aid, abet, comfort, and divert, the
said ambassadors, although he knew them to be servants to a
prince who was lately an open enemy to his imperial majesty, and
in an open war against his said majesty.
"'That the said Quinbus Flestrin, contrary to the duty of a faithful
subject, is now preparing to make a voyage to the court and
empire of Blefuscu, for which he has received only verbal license
from his imperial majesty; and, under colour of the said license,
does falsely and traitorously intend to take the said voyage, and
thereby to aid, comfort, and abet the emperor of Blefuscu, so
lately an enemy, and in open war with his imperial majesty
aforesaid.'
"There are some other articles; but these are the most important,
of which I have read you an abstract..
"In the several debates upon this impeachment, it must be
confessed that his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity;
often urging the services you had done him, and endeavouring to
extenuate your crimes. The treasurer and admiral insisted that you
should be put to the most painful and ignominious death, by
setting fire to your house at night, and the general was to attend
with twenty thousand men, armed with poisoned arrows, to shoot
you on the face and hands. Some of your servants were to have
private orders to strew a poisonous juice on your shirts and sheets,
which would soon make you tear your own flesh, and die in the
utmost torture. The general came into the same opinion; so that
for a long time there was a majority against you; but his majesty
resolving, if possible, to spare your life, at last brought off the
chamberlain.
"Upon this incident, Reldresal, principal secretary for private
affairs, who always approved himself your true friend, was
commanded by the emperor to deliver his opinion, which he
accordingly did; and therein justified the good thoughts you have
of him. He allowed your crimes to be great, but that still there was
room for mercy, the most commendable virtue in a prince, and for
which his majesty was so justly celebrated. He said, the friendship
between you and him was so well known to the world, that
perhaps the most honourable board might think him partial;
however, in obedience to the command he had received, he would
freely offer his sentiments. That if his majesty, in consideration of
your services, and pursuant to his own merciful disposition,
would please to spare your life, and only give orders to put out.
both your eyes, he humbly conceived, that by this expedient
justice might in some measure be satisfied, and all the world
would applaud the lenity of the emperor, as well as the fair and
generous proceedings of those who have the honour to be his
counsellors. That the loss of your eyes would be no impediment to
your bodily strength, by which you might still be useful to his
majesty; that blindness is an addition to courage, by concealing
dangers from us; that the fear you had for your eyes, was the
greatest difficulty in bringing over the enemy's fleet, and it would
be sufficient for you to see by the eyes of the ministers, since the
greatest princes do no more.
"This proposal was received with the utmost disapprobation by
the whole board. Bolgolam, the admiral, could not preserve his
temper, but, rising up in fury, said, he wondered how the secretary
durst presume to give his opinion for preserving the life of a
traitor; that the services you had performed were, by all true
reasons of state, the great aggravation of your crimes; that you,
who were able to extinguish the fire by discharge of urine in her
majesty's apartment (which he mentioned with horror), might, at
another time, raise an inundation by the same means, to drown the
whole palace; and the same strength which enabled you to bring
over the enemy's fleet, might serve, upon the first discontent, to
carry it back; that he had good reasons to think you were a Big-endian
in your heart; and, as treason begins in the heart, before it
appears in overt-acts, so he accused you as a traitor on that
account, and therefore insisted you should be put to death..
"The treasurer was of the same opinion: he showed to what straits
his majesty's revenue was reduced, by the charge of maintaining
you, which would soon grow insupportable; that the secretary's
expedient of putting out your eyes, was so far from being a
remedy against this evil, that it would probably increase it, as is
manifest from the common practice of blinding some kind of
fowls, after which they fed the faster, and grew sooner fat; that his
sacred majesty and the council, who are your judges, were, in
their own consciences, fully convinced of your guilt, which was a
sufficient argument to condemn you to death, without the formal
proofs required by the strict letter of the law.
"But his imperial majesty, fully determined against capital
punishment, was graciously pleased to say, that since the council
thought the loss of your eyes too easy a censure, some other way
may be inflicted hereafter. And your friend the secretary, humbly
desiring to be heard again, in answer to what the treasurer had
objected, concerning the great charge his majesty was at in
maintaining you, said, that his excellency, who had the sole
disposal of the emperor's revenue, might easily provide against
that evil, by gradually lessening your establishment; by which, for
want of sufficient for you would grow weak and faint, and lose
your appetite, and consequently, decay, and consume in a few
months; neither would the stench of your carcass be then so
dangerous, when it should become more than half diminished; and
immediately upon your death five or six thousand of his majesty's
subjects might, in two or three days, cut your flesh from your.
bones, take it away by cart-loads, and bury it in distant parts, to
prevent infection, leaving the skeleton as a monument of
admiration to posterity.
"Thus, by the great friendship of the secretary, the whole affair
was compromised. It was strictly enjoined, that the project of
starving you by degrees should be kept a secret; but the sentence
of putting out your eyes was entered on the books; none
dissenting, except Bolgolam the admiral, who, being a creature of
the empress, was perpetually instigated by her majesty to insist
upon your death, she having borne perpetual malice against you,
on account of that infamous and illegal method you took to
extinguish the fire in her apartment.
"In three days your friend the secretary will be directed to come to
your house, and read before you the articles of impeachment; and
then to signify the great lenity and favour of his majesty and
council, whereby you are only condemned to the loss of your
eyes, which his majesty does not question you will gratefully and
humbly submit to; and twenty of his majesty's surgeons will
attend, in order to see the operation well performed, by
discharging very sharp-pointed arrows into the balls of your eyes,
as you lie on the ground.
"I leave to your prudence what measures you will take; and to
avoid suspicion, I must immediately return in as private a manner
as I came.".
His lordship did so; and I remained alone, under many doubts and
perplexities of mind.
It was a custom introduced by this prince and his ministry (very
different, as I have been assured, from the practice of former
times,) that after the court had decreed any cruel execution, either
to gratify the monarch's resentment, or the malice of a favourite,
the emperor always made a speech to his whole council,
expressing his great lenity and tenderness, as qualities known and
confessed by all the world. This speech was immediately
published throughout the kingdom; nor did any thing terrify the
people so much as those encomiums on his majesty's mercy;
because it was observed, that the more these praises were enlarged
and insisted on, the more inhuman was the punishment, and the
sufferer more innocent. Yet, as to myself, I must confess, having
never been designed for a courtier, either by my birth or
education, I was so ill a judge of things, that I could not discover
the lenity and favour of this sentence, but conceived it (perhaps
erroneously) rather to be rigorous than gentle. I sometimes
thought of standing my trial, for, although I could not deny the
facts alleged in the several articles, yet I hoped they would admit
of some extenuation. But having in my life perused many state-trials,
which I ever observed to terminate as the judges thought fit
to direct, I durst not rely on so dangerous a decision, in so critical
a juncture, and against such powerful enemies. Once I was
strongly bent upon resistance, for, while I had liberty the whole
strength of that empire could hardly subdue me, and I might easily
with stones pelt the metropolis to pieces; but I soon rejected that
project with horror, by remembering the oath I had made to the.
emperor, the favours I received from him, and the high title of
NARDAC he conferred upon me. Neither had I so soon learned
the gratitude of courtiers, to persuade myself, that his majesty's
present seventies acquitted me of all past obligations.
At last, I fixed upon a resolution, for which it is probable I may
incur some censure, and not unjustly; for I confess I owe the
preserving of mine eyes, and consequently my liberty, to my own
great rashness and want of experience; because, if I had then
known the nature of princes and ministers, which I have since
observed in many other courts, and their methods of treating
criminals less obnoxious than myself, I should, with great alacrity
and readiness, have submitted to so easy a punishment. But
hurried on by the precipitancy of youth, and having his imperial
majesty's license to pay my attendance upon the emperor of
Blefuscu, I took this opportunity, before the three days were
elapsed, to send a letter to my friend the secretary, signifying my
resolution of setting out that morning for Blefuscu, pursuant to the
leave I had got; and, without waiting for an answer, I went to that
side of the island where our fleet lay. I seized a large man of war,
tied a cable to the prow, and, lifting up the anchors, I stripped
myself, put my clothes (together with my coverlet, which I carried
under my arm) into the vessel, and, drawing it after me, between
wading and swimming arrived at the royal port of Blefuscu, where
the people had long expected me: they lent me two guides to
direct me to the capital city, which is of the same name. I held
them in my hands, till I came within two hundred yards of the
gate, and desired them "to signify my arrival to one of the
secretaries, and let him know, I there waited his majesty's.
command." I had an answer in about an hour, "that his majesty,
attended by the royal family, and great officers of the court, was
coming out to receive me." I advanced a hundred yards. The
emperor and his train alighted from their horses, the empress and
ladies from their coaches, and I did not perceive they were in any
fright or concern. I lay on the ground to kiss his majesty's and the
empress's hands. I told his majesty, "that I was come according to
my promise, and with the license of the emperor my master, to
have the honour of seeing so mighty a monarch, and to offer him
any service in my power, consistent with my duty to my own
prince;" not mentioning a word of my disgrace, because I had
hitherto no regular information of it, and might suppose myself
wholly ignorant of any such design; neither could I reasonably
conceive that the emperor would discover the secret, while I was
out of his power; wherein, however, it soon appeared I was
deceived.
I shall not trouble the reader with the particular account of my
reception at this court, which was suitable to the generosity of so
great a prince; nor of the difficulties I was in for want of a house
and bed, being forced to lie on the ground, wrapped up in my
coverlet..
[The author, by a lucky accident, finds means to leave Blefuscu;
and, after some difficulties, returns safe to his native country.]
Three days after my arrival, walking out of curiosity to the north-east
coast of the island, I observed, about half a league off in the
sea, somewhat that looked like a boat overturned. I pulled off my
shoes and stockings, and, wailing two or three hundred yards, I
found the object to approach nearer by force of the tide; and then
plainly saw it to be a real boat, which I supposed might by some
tempest have been driven from a ship. Whereupon, I returned
immediately towards the city, and desired his imperial majesty to
lend me twenty of the tallest vessels he had left, after the loss of
his fleet, and three thousand seamen, under the command of his
vice-admiral. This fleet sailed round, while I went back the
shortest way to the coast, where I first discovered the boat. I found
the tide had driven it still nearer. The seamen were all provided
with cordage, which I had beforehand twisted to a sufficient
strength. When the ships came up, I stripped myself, and waded
till I came within a hundred yards off the boat, after which I was
forced to swim till I got up to it. The seamen threw me the end of
the cord, which I fastened to a hole in the fore-part of the boat,
and the other end to a man of war; but I found all my labour to
little purpose; for, being out of my depth, I was not able to work..
In this necessity I was forced to swim behind, and push the boat
forward, as often as I could, with one of my hands; and the tide
favouring me, I advanced so far that I could just hold up my chin
and feel the ground. I rested two or three minutes, and then gave
the boat another shove, and so on, till the sea was no higher than
my arm-pits; and now, the most laborious part being over, I took
out my other cables, which were stowed in one of the ships, and
fastened them first to the boat, and then to nine of the vessels
which attended me; the wind being favourable, the seamen towed,
and I shoved, until we arrived within forty yards of the shore; and,
waiting till the tide was out, I got dry to the boat, and by the
assistance of two thousand men, with ropes and engines, I made a
shift to turn it on its bottom, and found it was but little damaged.
I shall not trouble the reader with the difficulties I was under, by
the help of certain paddles, which cost me ten days making, to get
my boat to the royal port of Blefuscu, where a mighty concourse
of people appeared upon my arrival, full of wonder at the sight of
so prodigious a vessel. I told the emperor "that my good fortune
had thrown this boat in my way, to carry me to some place whence
I might return into my native country; and begged his majesty's
orders for getting materials to fit it up, together with his license to
depart;" which, after some kind expostulations, he was pleased to
grant.
I did very much wonder, in all this time, not to have heard of any
express relating to me from our emperor to the court of Blefuscu.
But I was afterward given privately to understand, that his
imperial majesty, never imagining I had the least notice of his.
designs, believed I was only gone to Blefuscu in performance of
my promise, according to the license he had given me, which was
well known at our court, and would return in a few days, when the
ceremony was ended. But he was at last in pain at my long
absence; and after consulting with the treasurer and the rest of that
cabal, a person of quality was dispatched with the copy of the
articles against me. This envoy had instructions to represent to the
monarch of Blefuscu, "the great lenity of his master, who was
content to punish me no farther than with the loss of mine eyes;
that I had fled from justice; and if I did not return in two hours, I
should be deprived of my title of NARDAC, and declared a
traitor." The envoy further added, "that in order to maintain the
peace and amity between both empires, his master expected that
his brother of Blefuscu would give orders to have me sent back to
Lilliput, bound hand and foot, to be punished as a traitor."
The emperor of Blefuscu, having taken three days to consult,
returned an answer consisting of many civilities and excuses. He
said, "that as for sending me bound, his brother knew it was
impossible; that, although I had deprived him of his fleet, yet he
owed great obligations to me for many good offices I had done
him in making the peace. That, however, both their majesties
would soon be made easy; for I had found a prodigious vessel on
the shore, able to carry me on the sea, which he had given orders
to fit up, with my own assistance and direction; and he hoped, in a
few weeks, both empires would be freed from so insupportable an
encumbrance.".
With this answer the envoy returned to Lilliput; and the monarch
of Blefuscu related to me all that had passed; offering me at the
same time (but under the strictest confidence) his gracious
protection, if I would continue in his service; wherein, although I
believed him sincere, yet I resolved never more to put any
confidence in princes or ministers, where I could possibly avoid
it; and therefore, with all due acknowledgments for his favourable
intentions, I humbly begged to be excused. I told him, "that since
fortune, whether good or evil, had thrown a vessel in my way, I
was resolved to venture myself on the ocean, rather than be an
occasion of difference between two such mighty monarchs."
Neither did I find the emperor at all displeased; and I discovered,
by a certain accident, that he was very glad of my resolution, and
so were most of his ministers.
These considerations moved me to hasten my departure somewhat
sooner than I intended; to which the court, impatient to have me
gone, very readily contributed. Five hundred workmen were
employed to make two sails to my boat, according to my
directions, by quilting thirteen folds of their strongest linen
together. I was at the pains of making ropes and cables, by
twisting ten, twenty, or thirty of the thickest and strongest of
theirs. A great stone that I happened to find, after a long search, by
the sea-shore, served me for an anchor. I had the tallow of three
hundred cows, for greasing my boat, and other uses. I was at
incredible pains in cutting down some of the largest timber-trees,
for oars and masts, wherein I was, however, much assisted by his
majesty's ship-carpenters, who helped me in smoothing them,
after I had done the rough work..
In about a month, when all was prepared, I sent to receive his
majesty's commands, and to take my leave. The emperor and
royal family came out of the palace; I lay down on my face to kiss
his hand, which he very graciously gave me: so did the empress
and young princes of the blood. His majesty presented me with
fifty purses of two hundred SPRUGS a-piece, together with his
picture at full length, which I put immediately into one of my
gloves, to keep it from being hurt. The ceremonies at my
departure were too many to trouble the reader with at this time.
I stored the boat with the carcases of a hundred oxen, and three
hundred sheep, with bread and drink proportionable, and as much
meat ready dressed as four hundred cooks could provide. I took
with me six cows and two bulls alive, with as many ewes and
rams, intending to carry them into my own country, and propagate
the breed. And to feed them on board, I had a good bundle of hay,
and a bag of corn. I would gladly have taken a dozen of the
natives, but this was a thing the emperor would by no means
permit; and, besides a diligent search into my pockets, his majesty
engaged my honour "not to carry away any of his subjects,
although with their own consent and desire."
Having thus prepared all things as well as I was able, I set sail on
the twenty-fourth day of September 1701, at six in the morning;
and when I had gone about four-leagues to the northward, the
wind being at south-east, at six in the evening I descried a small
island, about half a league to the north-west. I advanced forward,