Gulliver\'s Travels

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Transcribed from the 1892 George Bell and Sons edition by
David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk

Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World
by Jonathan Swift

THE PUBLISHER TO THE READER.

[As given in the original edition.]

The author of these Travels, Mr. Lemuel Gulliver, is my ancient and
intimate friend; there is likewise some relation between us on the
mother's side. About three years ago, Mr. Gulliver growing weary
of the concourse of curious people coming to him at his house in
Redriff, made a small purchase of land, with a convenient house,
near Newark, in Nottinghamshire, his native country; where he now
lives retired, yet in good esteem among his neighbours.

Although Mr. Gulliver was born in Nottinghamshire, where his father
dwelt, yet I have heard him say his family came from Oxfordshire;
to confirm which, I have observed in the churchyard at Banbury in
that county, several tombs and monuments of the Gullivers.

Before he quitted Redriff, he left the custody of the following
papers in my hands, with the liberty to dispose of them as I should
think fit. I have carefully perused them three times. The style
is very plain and simple; and the only fault I find is, that the
author, after the manner of travellers, is a little too
circumstantial. There is an air of truth apparent through the
whole; and indeed the author was so distinguished for his veracity,
that it became a sort of proverb among his neighbours at Redriff,
when any one affirmed a thing, to say, it was as true as if Mr.
Gulliver had spoken it.

By the advice of several worthy persons, to whom, with the author's
permission, I communicated these papers, I now venture to send them
into the world, hoping they may be, at least for some time, a
better entertainment to our young noblemen, than the common
scribbles of politics and party.

This volume would have been at least twice as large, if I had not
made bold to strike out innumerable passages relating to the winds
and tides, as well as to the variations and bearings in the several
voyages, together with the minute descriptions of the management of
the ship in storms, in the style of sailors; likewise the account
of longitudes and latitudes; wherein I have reason to apprehend,
that Mr. Gulliver may be a little dissatisfied. But I was resolved
to fit the work as much as possible to the general capacity of
readers. However, if my own ignorance in sea affairs shall have
led me to commit some mistakes, I alone am answerable for them.
And if any traveller hath a curiosity to see the whole work at
large, as it came from the hands of the author, I will be ready to
gratify him.

As for any further particulars relating to the author, the reader
will receive satisfaction from the first pages of the book.

RICHARD SYMPSON.

A LETTER FROM CAPTAIN GULLIVER TO HIS COUSIN SYMPSON.

WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1727.

I hope you will be ready to own publicly, whenever you shall be
called to it, that by your great and frequent urgency you prevailed
on me to publish a very loose and uncorrect account of my travels,
with directions to hire some young gentleman of either university
to put them in order, and correct the style, as my cousin Dampier
did, by my advice, in his book called "A Voyage round the world."
But I do not remember I gave you power to consent that any thing
should be omitted, and much less that any thing should be inserted;
therefore, as to the latter, I do here renounce every thing of that
kind; particularly a paragraph about her majesty Queen Anne, of
most pious and glorious memory; although I did reverence and esteem
her more than any of human species. But you, or your interpolator,
ought to have considered, that it was not my inclination, so was it
not decent to praise any animal of our composition before my master
Houyhnhnm: And besides, the fact was altogether false; for to my
knowledge, being in England during some part of her majesty's
reign, she did govern by a chief minister; nay even by two
successively, the first whereof was the lord of Godolphin, and the
second the lord of Oxford; so that you have made me say the thing
that was not. Likewise in the account of the academy of
projectors, and several passages of my discourse to my master
Houyhnhnm, you have either omitted some material circumstances, or
minced or changed them in such a manner, that I do hardly know my
own work. When I formerly hinted to you something of this in a
letter, you were pleased to answer that you were afraid of giving
offence; that people in power were very watchful over the press,
and apt not only to interpret, but to punish every thing which
looked like an innuendo (as I think you call it). But, pray how
could that which I spoke so many years ago, and at about five
thousand leagues distance, in another reign, be applied to any of
the Yahoos, who now are said to govern the herd; especially at a
time when I little thought, or feared, the unhappiness of living
under them? Have not I the most reason to complain, when I see
these very Yahoos carried by Houyhnhnms in a vehicle, as if they
were brutes, and those the rational creatures? And indeed to avoid
so monstrous and detestable a sight was one principal motive of my
retirement hither.

Thus much I thought proper to tell you in relation to yourself, and
to the trust I reposed in you.

I do, in the next place, complain of my own great want of judgment,
in being prevailed upon by the entreaties and false reasoning of
you and some others, very much against my own opinion, to suffer my
travels to be published. Pray bring to your mind how often I
desired you to consider, when you insisted on the motive of public
good, that the Yahoos were a species of animals utterly incapable
of amendment by precept or example: and so it has proved; for,
instead of seeing a full stop put to all abuses and corruptions, at
least in this little island, as I had reason to expect; behold,
after above six months warning, I cannot learn that my book has
produced one single effect according to my intentions. I desired
you would let me know, by a letter, when party and faction were
extinguished; judges learned and upright; pleaders honest and
modest, with some tincture of common sense, and Smithfield blazing
with pyramids of law books; the young nobility's education entirely
changed; the physicians banished; the female Yahoos abounding in
virtue, honour, truth, and good sense; courts and levees of great
ministers thoroughly weeded and swept; wit, merit, and learning
rewarded; all disgracers of the press in prose and verse condemned
to eat nothing but their own cotton, and quench their thirst with
their own ink. These, and a thousand other reformations, I firmly
counted upon by your encouragement; as indeed they were plainly
deducible from the precepts delivered in my book. And it must be
owned, that seven months were a sufficient time to correct every
vice and folly to which Yahoos are subject, if their natures had
been capable of the least disposition to virtue or wisdom. Yet, so
far have you been from answering my expectation in any of your
letters; that on the contrary you are loading our carrier every
week with libels, and keys, and reflections, and memoirs, and
second parts; wherein I see myself accused of reflecting upon great
state folk; of degrading human nature (for so they have still the
confidence to style it), and of abusing the female sex. I find
likewise that the writers of those bundles are not agreed among
themselves; for some of them will not allow me to be the author of
my own travels; and others make me author of books to which I am
wholly a stranger.

I find likewise that your printer has been so careless as to
confound the times, and mistake the dates, of my several voyages
and returns; neither assigning the true year, nor the true month,
nor day of the month: and I hear the original manuscript is all
destroyed since the publication of my book; neither have I any copy
left: however, I have sent you some corrections, which you may
insert, if ever there should be a second edition: and yet I cannot
stand to them; but shall leave that matter to my judicious and
candid readers to adjust it as they please.

I hear some of our sea Yahoos find fault with my sea-language, as
not proper in many parts, nor now in use. I cannot help it. In my
first voyages, while I was young, I was instructed by the oldest
mariners, and learned to speak as they did. But I have since found
that the sea Yahoos are apt, like the land ones, to become new-
fangled in their words, which the latter change every year;
insomuch, as I remember upon each return to my own country their
old dialect was so altered, that I could hardly understand the new.
And I observe, when any Yahoo comes from London out of curiosity to
visit me at my house, we neither of us are able to deliver our
conceptions in a manner intelligible to the other.

If the censure of the Yahoos could any way affect me, I should have
great reason to complain, that some of them are so bold as to think
my book of travels a mere fiction out of mine own brain, and have
gone so far as to drop hints, that the Houyhnhnms and Yahoos have
no more existence than the inhabitants of Utopia.

Indeed I must confess, that as to the people of Lilliput,
Brobdingrag (for so the word should have been spelt, and not
erroneously Brobdingnag), and Laputa, I have never yet heard of any
Yahoo so presumptuous as to dispute their being, or the facts I
have related concerning them; because the truth immediately strikes
every reader with conviction. And is there less probability in my
account of the Houyhnhnms or Yahoos, when it is manifest as to the
latter, there are so many thousands even in this country, who only
differ from their brother brutes in Houyhnhnmland, because they use
a sort of jabber, and do not go naked? I wrote for their
amendment, and not their approbation. The united praise of the
whole race would be of less consequence to me, than the neighing of
those two degenerate Houyhnhnms I keep in my stable; because from
these, degenerate as they are, I still improve in some virtues
without any mixture of vice.

Do these miserable animals presume to think, that I am so
degenerated as to defend my veracity? Yahoo as I am, it is well
known through all Houyhnhnmland, that, by the instructions and
example of my illustrious master, I was able in the compass of two
years (although I confess with the utmost difficulty) to remove
that infernal habit of lying, shuffling, deceiving, and
equivocating, so deeply rooted in the very souls of all my species;
especially the Europeans.

I have other complaints to make upon this vexatious occasion; but I
forbear troubling myself or you any further. I must freely
confess, that since my last return, some corruptions of my Yahoo
nature have revived in me by conversing with a few of your species,
and particularly those of my own family, by an unavoidable
necessity; else I should never have attempted so absurd a project
as that of reforming the Yahoo race in this kingdom: But I have
now done with all such visionary schemes for ever.

April 2, 1727

PART I--A VOYAGE TO LILLIPUT.

CHAPTER I.

[The author gives some account of himself and family. His first
inducements to travel. He is shipwrecked, and swims for his life.
Gets safe on shore in the country of Lilliput; is made a prisoner,
and carried up the country.]

My father had a small estate in Nottinghamshire: I was the third
of five sons. He sent me to Emanuel College in Cambridge at
fourteen years old, where I resided three years, and applied myself
close to my studies; but the charge of maintaining me, although I
had a very scanty allowance, being too great for a narrow fortune,
I was bound apprentice to Mr. James Bates, an eminent surgeon in
London, with whom I continued four years. My father now and then
sending me small sums of money, I laid them out in learning
navigation, and other parts of the mathematics, useful to those who
intend to travel, as I always believed it would be, some time or
other, my fortune to do. When I left Mr. Bates, I went down to my
father: where, by the assistance of him and my uncle John, and
some other relations, I got forty pounds, and a promise of thirty
pounds a year to maintain me at Leyden: there I studied physic two
years and seven months, knowing it would be useful in long voyages.

Soon after my return from Leyden, I was recommended by my good
master, Mr. Bates, to be surgeon to the Swallow, Captain Abraham
Pannel, commander; with whom I continued three years and a half,
making a voyage or two into the Levant, and some other parts. When
I came back I resolved to settle in London; to which Mr. Bates, my
master, encouraged me, and by him I was recommended to several
patients. I took part of a small house in the Old Jewry; and being
advised to alter my condition, I married Mrs. Mary Burton, second
daughter to Mr. Edmund Burton, hosier, in Newgate-street, with whom
I received four hundred pounds for a portion.

But my good master Bates dying in two years after, and I having few
friends, my business began to fail; for my conscience would not
suffer me to imitate the bad practice of too many among my
brethren. Having therefore consulted with my wife, and some of my
acquaintance, I determined to go again to sea. I was surgeon
successively in two ships, and made several voyages, for six years,
to the East and West Indies, by which I got some addition to my
fortune. My hours of leisure I spent in reading the best authors,
ancient and modern, being always provided with a good number of
books; and when I was ashore, in observing the manners and
dispositions of the people, as well as learning their language;
wherein I had a great facility, by the strength of my memory.

The last of these voyages not proving very fortunate, I grew weary
of the sea, and intended to stay at home with my wife and family.
I removed from the Old Jewry to Fetter Lane, and from thence to
Wapping, hoping to get business among the sailors; but it would not
turn to account. After three years expectation that things would
mend, I accepted an advantageous offer from Captain William
Prichard, master of the Antelope, who was making a voyage to the
South Sea. We set sail from Bristol, May 4, 1699, and our voyage
was at first very prosperous.

It would not be proper, for some reasons, to trouble the reader
with the particulars of our adventures in those seas; let it
suffice to inform him, that in our passage from thence to the East
Indies, we were driven by a violent storm to the north-west of Van
Diemen's Land. By an observation, we found ourselves in the
latitude of 30 degrees 2 minutes south. Twelve of our crew were
dead by immoderate labour and ill food; the rest were in a very
weak condition. On the 5th of November, which was the beginning of
summer in those parts, the weather being very hazy, the seamen
spied a rock within half a cable's length of the ship; but the wind
was so strong, that we were driven directly upon it, and
immediately split. Six of the crew, of whom I was one, having let
down the boat into the sea, made a shift to get clear of the ship
and the rock. We rowed, by my computation, about three leagues,
till we were able to work no longer, being already spent with
labour while we were in the ship. We therefore trusted ourselves
to the mercy of the waves, and in about half an hour the boat was
overset by a sudden flurry from the north. What became of my
companions in the boat, as well as of those who escaped on the
rock, or were left in the vessel, I cannot tell; but conclude they
were all lost. For my own part, I swam as fortune directed me, and
was pushed forward by wind and tide. I often let my legs drop, and
could feel no bottom; but when I was almost gone, and able to
struggle no longer, I found myself within my depth; and by this
time the storm was much abated. The declivity was so small, that I
walked near a mile before I got to the shore, which I conjectured
was about eight o'clock in the evening. I then advanced forward
near half a mile, but could not discover any sign of houses or
inhabitants; at least I was in so weak a condition, that I did not
observe them. I was extremely tired, and with that, and the heat
of the weather, and about half a pint of brandy that I drank as I
left the ship, I found myself much inclined to sleep. I lay down
on the grass, which was very short and soft, where I slept sounder
than ever I remembered to have done in my life, and, as I reckoned,
about nine hours; for when I awaked, it was just day-light. I
attempted to rise, but was not able to stir: for, as I happened to
lie on my back, I found my arms and legs were strongly fastened on
each side to the ground; and my hair, which was long and thick,
tied down in the same manner. I likewise felt several slender
ligatures across my body, from my arm-pits to my thighs. I could
only look upwards; the sun began to grow hot, and the light
offended my eyes. I heard a confused noise about me; but in the
posture I lay, could see nothing except the sky. In a little time
I felt something alive moving on my left leg, which advancing
gently forward over my breast, came almost up to my chin; when,
bending my eyes downwards as much as I could, I perceived it to be
a human creature not six inches high, with a bow and arrow in his
hands, and a quiver at his back. In the mean time, I felt at least
forty more of the same kind (as I conjectured) following the first.
I was in the utmost astonishment, and roared so loud, that they all
ran back in a fright; and some of them, as I was afterwards told,
were hurt with the falls they got by leaping from my sides upon the
ground. However, they soon returned, and one of them, who ventured
so far as to get a full sight of my face, lifting up his hands and
eyes by way of admiration, cried out in a shrill but distinct
voice, Hekinah degul: the others repeated the same words several
times, but then I knew not what they meant. I lay all this while,
as the reader may believe, in great uneasiness. At length,
struggling to get loose, I had the fortune to break the strings,
and wrench out the pegs that fastened my left arm to the ground;
for, by lifting it up to my face, I discovered the methods they had
taken to bind me, and at the same time with a violent pull, which
gave me excessive pain, I a little loosened the strings that tied
down my hair on the left side, so that I was just able to turn my
head about two inches. But the creatures ran off a second time,
before I could seize them; whereupon there was a great shout in a
very shrill accent, and after it ceased I heard one of them cry
aloud Tolgo phonac; when in an instant I felt above a hundred
arrows discharged on my left hand, which, pricked me like so many
needles; and besides, they shot another flight into the air, as we
do bombs in Europe, whereof many, I suppose, fell on my body,
(though I felt them not), and some on my face, which I immediately
covered with my left hand. When this shower of arrows was over, I
fell a groaning with grief and pain; and then striving again to get
loose, they discharged another volley larger than the first, and
some of them attempted with spears to stick me in the sides; but by
good luck I had on a buff jerkin, which they could not pierce. I
thought it the most prudent method to lie still, and my design was
to continue so till night, when, my left hand being already loose,
I could easily free myself: and as for the inhabitants, I had
reason to believe I might be a match for the greatest army they
could bring against me, if they were all of the same size with him
that I saw. But fortune disposed otherwise of me. When the people
observed I was quiet, they discharged no more arrows; but, by the
noise I heard, I knew their numbers increased; and about four yards
from me, over against my right ear, I heard a knocking for above an
hour, like that of people at work; when turning my head that way,
as well as the pegs and strings would permit me, I saw a stage
erected about a foot and a half from the ground, capable of holding
four of the inhabitants, with two or three ladders to mount it:
from whence one of them, who seemed to be a person of quality, made
me a long speech, whereof I understood not one syllable. But I
should have mentioned, that before the principal person began his
oration, he cried out three times, Langro dehul san (these words
and the former were afterwards repeated and explained to me);
whereupon, immediately, about fifty of the inhabitants came and cut
the strings that fastened the left side of my head, which gave me
the liberty of turning it to the right, and of observing the person
and gesture of him that was to speak. He appeared to be of a
middle age, and taller than any of the other three who attended
him, whereof one was a page that held up his train, and seemed to
be somewhat longer than my middle finger; the other two stood one
on each side to support him. He acted every part of an orator, and
I could observe many periods of threatenings, and others of
promises, pity, and kindness. I answered in a few words, but in
the most submissive manner, lifting up my left hand, and both my
eyes to the sun, as calling him for a witness; and being almost
famished with hunger, having not eaten a morsel for some hours
before I left the ship, I found the demands of nature so strong
upon me, that I could not forbear showing my impatience (perhaps
against the strict rules of decency) by putting my finger
frequently to my mouth, to signify that I wanted food. The hurgo
(for so they call a great lord, as I afterwards learnt) understood
me very well. He descended from the stage, and commanded that
several ladders should be applied to my sides, on which above a
hundred of the inhabitants mounted and walked towards my mouth,
laden with baskets full of meat, which had been provided and sent
thither by the king's orders, upon the first intelligence he
received of me. I observed there was the flesh of several animals,
but could not distinguish them by the taste. There were shoulders,
legs, and loins, shaped like those of mutton, and very well
dressed, but smaller than the wings of a lark. I ate them by two
or three at a mouthful, and took three loaves at a time, about the
bigness of musket bullets. They supplied me as fast as they could,
showing a thousand marks of wonder and astonishment at my bulk and
appetite. I then made another sign, that I wanted drink. They
found by my eating that a small quantity would not suffice me; and
being a most ingenious people, they slung up, with great dexterity,
one of their largest hogsheads, then rolled it towards my hand, and
beat out the top; I drank it off at a draught, which I might well
do, for it did not hold half a pint, and tasted like a small wine
of Burgundy, but much more delicious. They brought me a second
hogshead, which I drank in the same manner, and made signs for
more; but they had none to give me. When I had performed these
wonders, they shouted for joy, and danced upon my breast, repeating
several times as they did at first, Hekinah degul. They made me a
sign that I should throw down the two hogsheads, but first warning
the people below to stand out of the way, crying aloud, Borach
mevolah; and when they saw the vessels in the air, there was a
universal shout of Hekinah degul. I confess I was often tempted,
while they were passing backwards and forwards on my body, to seize
forty or fifty of the first that came in my reach, and dash them
against the ground. But the remembrance of what I had felt, which
probably might not be the worst they could do, and the promise of
honour I made them--for so I interpreted my submissive behaviour--
soon drove out these imaginations. Besides, I now considered
myself as bound by the laws of hospitality, to a people who had
treated me with so much expense and magnificence. However, in my
thoughts I could not sufficiently wonder at the intrepidity of
these diminutive mortals, who durst venture to mount and walk upon
my body, while one of my hands was at liberty, without trembling at
the very sight of so prodigious a creature as I must appear to
them. After some time, when they observed that I made no more
demands for meat, there appeared before me a person of high rank
from his imperial majesty. His excellency, having mounted on the
small of my right leg, advanced forwards up to my face, with about
a dozen of his retinue; and producing his credentials under the
signet royal, which he applied close to my eyes, spoke about ten
minutes without any signs of anger, but with a kind of determinate
resolution, often pointing forwards, which, as I afterwards found,
was towards the capital city, about half a mile distant; whither it
was agreed by his majesty in council that I must be conveyed. I
answered in few words, but to no purpose, and made a sign with my
hand that was loose, putting it to the other (but over his
excellency's head for fear of hurting him or his train) and then to
my own head and body, to signify that I desired my liberty. It
appeared that he understood me well enough, for he shook his head
by way of disapprobation, and held his hand in a posture to show
that I must be carried as a prisoner. However, he made other signs
to let me understand that I should have meat and drink enough, and
very good treatment. Whereupon I once more thought of attempting
to break my bonds; but again, when I felt the smart of their arrows
upon my face and hands, which were all in blisters, and many of the
darts still sticking in them, and observing likewise that the
number of my enemies increased, I gave tokens to let them know that
they might do with me what they pleased. Upon this, the hurgo and
his train withdrew, with much civility and cheerful countenances.
Soon after I heard a general shout, with frequent repetitions of
the words Peplom selan; and I felt great numbers of people on my
left side relaxing the cords to such a degree, that I was able to
turn upon my right, and to ease myself with making water; which I
very plentifully did, to the great astonishment of the people; who,
conjecturing by my motion what I was going to do, immediately
opened to the right and left on that side, to avoid the torrent,
which fell with such noise and violence from me. But before this,
they had daubed my face and both my hands with a sort of ointment,
very pleasant to the smell, which, in a few minutes, removed all
the smart of their arrows. These circumstances, added to the
refreshment I had received by their victuals and drink, which were
very nourishing, disposed me to sleep. I slept about eight hours,
as I was afterwards assured; and it was no wonder, for the
physicians, by the emperor's order, had mingled a sleepy potion in
the hogsheads of wine.

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