Bab Bab 6 · Of the inhabitants of Lilliput; their learning, laws, and customs; the

. 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. [330]

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.