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very ridiculous figure. I believe it was near a minute before any one knew what was become of me; for I thought it below me to cry
out. But, as princes seldom get their meat hot, my legs were not scalded, only my stockings and breeches in a sad condition. The
dwarf, at my entreaty, had no other punishment than a sound whipping.
I was frequently rallied by the queen upon account of my fearfulness; and she used to ask me whether the people of my country were
as great cowards as myself? The occasion was this: the kingdom is much pestered with flies in summer; and these odious insects, each
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of them as big as a Dunstable lark, hardly gave me any rest while I sat at dinner, with their continual humming and buzzing about mine
ears. They would sometimes alight upon my victuals, and leave their loathsome excrement, or spawn behind, which to me was very
visible, though not to the natives of that country, whose large optics were not so acute as mine, in viewing smaller objects. Sometimes
they would fix upon my nose, or forehead, where they stung me to the quick, smelling very offensively; and I could easily trace that
viscous matter, which, our naturalists tell us, enables those creatures to walk with their feet upwards upon a ceiling. I had much ado to
defend myself against these detestable animals, and could not forbear starting when they came on my face. It was the common practice
of the dwarf, to catch a number of these insects in his hand, as schoolboys do among us, and let them out suddenly under my nose, on
purpose to frighten me, and divert the queen. My remedy was to cut them in pieces with my knife, as they flew in the air, wherein my
dexterity was much admired.
I remember, one morning, when Glumdalclitch had set me in a box upon a window, as she usually did in fair days to give me air (for I
durst not venture to let the box be hung on a nail out of the window, as we do with cages in England), after I had lifted up one of my
sashes, and sat down at my table to eat a piece of sweet cake for my breakfast, above twenty wasps, allured by the smell, came flying
into the room, humming louder than the drones of as many bagpipes. Some of them seized my cake, and carried it piecemeal away;
others flew about my head and face, confounding me with the noise, and putting me in the utmost terror of their stings. However, I had
the courage to rise and draw my hanger, and attack them in the air. I dispatched four of them, but the rest got away, and I presently
shut my window. These insects were as large as partridges: I took out their stings, found them an inch and a half long, and as sharp as
needles. I carefully preserved them all; and having since shown them, with some other curiosities, in several parts of Europe, upon my
return to England I gave three of them to Gresham College, and kept the fourth for myself.
CHAPTER IV
.
[The country described. A proposal for correcting modern maps. The king's palace; and some account of the metropolis. The author's
way of travelling. The chief temple described.]
I now intend to give the reader a short description of this country, as far as I travelled in it, which was not above two thousand miles
round Lorbrulgrud, the metropolis. For the queen, whom I always attended, never went farther when she accompanied the king in his
progresses, and there staid till his majesty returned from viewing his frontiers. The whole extent of this prince's dominions reaches
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 counterpoise the great continent of Tartary; and therefore they ought to correct their maps and charts, by joining this vast tract
of land to the north- west parts of America, wherein I shall be ready to lend them my assistance.
The kingdom is a peninsula, terminated to the north-east by a ridge of mountains thirty miles high, which are altogether impassable,
by reason of the volcanoes upon the tops: neither do the most 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 of the
same size with those in Europe, and consequently not worth catching; whereby it is manifest, that nature, in the production of plants [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]