Latest / Classic Adventure Books Library / 12 - Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift
Transcript
- Chapter four, The country described, a proposal for correcting modern maps, the King's Palace, and some account of the metropolis. The author's way of traveling the Chief Temple described. I now intend to give the reader a short description of this country, as far as I traveled in it, which was not above two thousand miles round Lauberalgrud, the metropolis, for the Queen, whom I always attended, never went farther when she was accompanied the King in his progress, and there stayed till his Majesty returned from viewing his frontiers. The whole extent of this prince's dominions reached about six thousand miles in length, and from three to five in breadth. Whence I cannot but conclude that our geographers of Europe are in a great error by supposing nothing but sea between Japan and California. For it was ever my opinion that there must be a balance of earth to counterpose the great continent of Tartary, And therefore they ought to correct their maps and charts by joining this vast tract of land to the northwest parts of America, wherein I shall be ready to lend them my assistance. The Kingdom is a peninsula terminated to the northeast by a ridge of mountains thirty miles high, which are altogether impossible by reason of the volcanoes upon the tops. Neither do most the learned know what sort of mortals inhabit beyond those mountains, or whether they be inhabited at all. On the three other sides, it is bounded by the ocean. There is not one seaport in the whole kingdom, And those parts of the coasts into which the rivers issue are so full of pointed rocks, and the sea generally so rough, that there is no venturing with the smallest of their boats, so that these people are wholly excluded from any commerce with the rest of the world. But the large rivers are full of vessels and abound with excellent fish, for they seldom get any from the sea, because the sea fish are on the same size with those in Europe, and consequently not worth catching. Whereby it is manifest that nature, in the production of plants and animals are so extremely a bulk is wholly confined to this continent, of which I leave the reasons to be determined by philosophers. However, now and then they take a whale that happens to be dashed against the rocks which the common people feed on heartily. These whales I have known, so large that a man could hardly carry one upon his shoulders, and sometimes for curiosity they are brought in hampers to liberal grows. I saw one of them in a dish at the King's table, which passed for a rarity, but I did not observe he was fond of it, for I think indeed the bigness disgusted him, although I have seen one somewhat larger in Greenland. The country is well inhabited, for it contains fifty one cities, near a hundred walled towns, and a great number of villages. To satisfy my curious reader, it may be sufficient to describe globeral Grud. This city stands upon almost two equal parts on each side of the river that passes through. It contains above eighty thousand houses and about six hundred thousand inhabitants. It is in length three glong lungs, which make about fifty four English miles and two and a half in breadth. As I measured it myself in the royal map made by the King's order, which was laid on the ground on purpose for me, and extended a hundred feet. I paced the diameter and circumference several times bare foot, and computing by the scale, measured it pretty exactly. The King's Palace is no regular edifice, but a heap of buildings about seven miles round. The chief rooms are generally two hundred and forty feet high, and broad and long in proportion. The coach was allowed to Glumdalklitch and me wherein her. Governess frequently took her out to see the town or go among the shops, and I was always of the party, carried in my box, although the girl, at my own desire, would often take me out and hold me in her hand, that I might more conveniently view the houses and the people as we passed along the streets. I reckoned our coach to be about a square of Westminster, but not altogether so high. However, I cannot be very exact. One day the Governess ordered our coachman to stop at several shops, where the beggars, watching their opportunity, crowded to the sides of the coach, and gave me the most horrible spectacle that ever a European eye beheld. There was a woman with a cancer in her breast, swelled to a monstrous size, full of holes in two or three of which I could easily have crept and covered my whole body. There was a fellow with a wen in his neck larger than five wool packs, and another with a couple of wooden legs, each about twenty feet high. But the most hateful sight of all was the lice crawling on their clothes. I could see distinctly the limbs of these vermin with my naked eye, much better than those of a European louse through a microscope, and their snouts, with which they rooted like swine. They were the first I had ever beheld, and I should have been curious enough to dissect one of them if I had had proper instruments, which I unluckily left behind me in the ship, although indeed the sight was so nauseous that it perfectly turned my stomach. Besides the large box in which I was usually carried, the Queen ordered a smaller one to be made for me, of about twelve feet square and ten high, for the convenience of traveling. Because the other was somewhat too large for Glumdalklitch's lap and Cumberson in the coach. It was made by the same artist whom I directed in the whole contrivance. This traveling closet was an exact square, with the window in the middle of three of the squares, and each window was latticed with iron wire on the outside to prevent accidents in long journeys. On the fourth side, which had no window, two strong staples were fixed through which the person that carried me, when I had a mind to be on horseback, put a leathern belt and buckled it about his waist. This was always the office of some grave, trusty servant in whom I could confide whether I attended the King and Queen in their progresses, or were disposed to see the gardens, or pay a visit to some great lady or minister of state in the court. When Glumdalklitch happened to be out of order, for I soon began to be known and esteemed among the greatest officers. I suppose, more upon account of their Majesty's favor than any merit of my own. In journeys, when I was weary of the coach, a servant on horseback would buckle on my box and place it on a cushion before him, and there I had a full prospect of the country on three sides from my three windows. I had in this closet a field bed and a hammock hung from the ceiling, two chairs and a table neatly screwed to the floor to prevent being tossed about by the agitation of the horse or the coach, And having been long used to see voyages, those motions, although sometimes very violent, did not much discompose me. Whenever I had a mind to see the town, it was always in my traveling closet, which Glumdalklitch held in her lap in a kind of open sedan after the fashion of the country, borne by four men and attended by two others in the queen's livery. The people who had often heard of me were very curious to crowd about the sedan, and the girl was complaisant enough to make the bearers stop and take me in a hand that I might be more conveniently seen. I was very desirous to see the chief temple, and particularly the tower belonging to it, which which is reckoned the highest in the kingdom. Accordingly, one day my nurse carried me thither, But I may truly say I came back disappointed, for the height is not above three thousand feet reckoning from the ground to the highest pinnacle top which align for the difference between the size of those people and us in Europe is no great matter for redmiration, nor at all equal in proportion. If I rightly remember to Salisbury' steeple, but not to detract from a nation to which during my life I shall acknowledge myself extremely obliged. It must be allowed that whatever this famous tower wants in height, it is amply made up in beauty and strength. For the walls a near one hundred feet thick, built of hewn stone, whereof each is about forty feet square, and adorned on all sides with statues of gods and emperors cut in marble larger than life, placed in several niches. I meationed a little finger which had fallen down from one of these statues and lay unperceived among some rubbish, and found it exactly four feet and an inch in length. Plumder Klitch wrapped it up in her handkerchief, and carried it home in her pocket to keep among other trinkets of which the girl was very fond, as children at her age usually are. The King's kitchen is indeed a noble building, vaulted at top and about six hundred feet high. The great oven is not so wide by ten paces as a coupel are at Saint Paul's. For I measured the latter on purpose after my return. But if I should describe the kitchen grate, the prodigious pots and kettles, the joints of meat turning on the spits, with many other particulars, perhaps I should be hard hardly believed. At least a severe critic would be apt to think I enlarged a little, as travelers are often suspected to do, to avoid which censor. I fear I have run too much into the other extreme, And that of this treatise should happen to be translated into the language of brobden Nag, which is the general name of that kingdom, and transmitted thither, the king and his people would have reason to complain that I'd done them an injury by a false and diminutive representation. His Majesty seldom keeps above six hundred horses. In his stables, they are generally from fifty four to sixty feet high. But when it goes abroad on solemn days, he is attended for state by a military guard of five hundred horses, which indeed I thought was the most splendid sights that could ever be beheld, till I saw a part of his army in Battler, where I shall find another occasion to speak. End of Chapter four, Part two,