Chapter-6
I would like to give a brief account of this country. The total length of the country was around six thousand miles and the breadth was about three to five thousand. But, I did not get the opportunity to travel the whole of the country. I could travel just about two thousand miles around Lorbrulgrud, the capital. The kingdom was a peninsula surrounded by the ocean on three sides. There was a huge range of mountains, about thirty miles high, on its north-east side. Such a big peninsula had gone unnoticed by our geographers who believed that there was nothing between Japan and California except the sea.
There were about fifty-one cities, a hundred towns, and a great number of villages in this country. About eighty thousand houses could be seen in the capital-city, Lorbrulgrud. The city was divided into two equal parts by a river that passed through the city. Glumdalclitch always carried me in my box whenever her governess took her out to see the city. Whenever I wished to see the outside world, she would take me out and place me on her hand. Hence, I would have a good view of the houses and the people around. My box was somewhat too large for Glumdalclitch’s lap, so the queen ordered the carpenter to make another smaller box. It was twelve feet square and ten feet high. Whenever we went to visit the town, Glumdalclitch held this travelling box in her lap.
By then, everyone in the palace knew me and often many people came to watch me. The ladies liked to dress and hold me. They were very enthusiastic to hear about my adventures in their country. Some of these experiences were quite dangerous for a tiny man like me.
My stay in Brobdingnag would have been a happy experience only if I did not have to face some funny but very troublesome situations. There was a dwarf in the queen’s palace who was the smallest man in the entire country. He was even less than thirty feet high. He used to entertain the queen with his tricks. With my arrival in the palace, he began to think that he was big. He never left a chance to make fun of my littleness.
Time and again, I used to visit the garden of the palace with Glumdalclitch who would carry me in the box. She sometime used to take me out of the box and place me on the ground so that I might have a walk. One day, the dwarf followed us into the garden. Glumdalclitch was sitting on the other side of the garden and I was just walking around. As soon as the dwarf found me alone under an apple tree, he shook the tree right above my head. A dozen apples fell down, one of which hit me so hard on the back that I fell on the ground with a bump. Luckily, I was not hurt much, but the incident shook me. When Glumdalclitch heard the noise, she came running from the other side of the garden and caught hold of the dwarf. She wanted to take the rogue to the queen and narrate all that had happened. But I did not want to make him my enemy, so I requested that he should be pardoned.
That incident had no effect on the dwarf. Another day, at dinner, that hateful creature found an opportunity to harm me again. After dinner, when everyone had left the table and Glumdalclitch had also gone somewhere for a minute, he quietly stepped in. He picked me up by the middle and dropped me into a silver bowl of cream, and ran away as fast as he could. Had I not been a good swimmer, I would have been drowned that day. On hearing the noise, my little nurse came running into the room. She carefully took me out of the bowl. She wiped off the cream from my clothes. Fortunately, I was saved. The queen also came to know of the incident and was very annoyed with the dwarf. She forced him to drink the same cream into which he had thrown me. He was then and there dismissed from the queen’s service and sent to some other lady who was the wife of some important man at the court. After that incident, I was greatly relieved since he was no more to be seen and cause harm to me.
The flies were very irritating, especially during summers. A swarm of flies always kept flying around. Each of the flies was as big as a lark. Whenever I sat for my meals, they would keep buzzing and humming around my ears. Sometimes, they would sit on my nose or forehead. They would sit on my food and would smell so foul that I would get irritated. The dwarf would often catch a number of them and release them suddenly under my nose to frighten me and to entertain the queen. As they flew in the air, I attacked them with my knife and cut some of them into pieces while others flew away. After seeing such a scene, the queen often made fun of my coyness and fearfulness. She used to ask me whether the people of my country were as great cowards as I was. Thereupon, I would just keep quiet.
It so happened that one day, Glumdalclitch put me in the garden and went away to talk to some of the ladies. Suddenly, there was a hailstorm. The hailstones were no smaller than the English tennis balls. I made a lot of efforts to escape those hailstones and crept on all fours to find a place to hide myself. In spite of that, some of them knocked me to the ground.
Another dangerous accident happened to me in the same garden after a few days. I sometime requested Glumdalclitch to leave me alone in the garden so that I might relax. That day, she had left my box at home to avoid the trouble of carrying it. She placed me at a safe place and went to another part of the garden, along with her governess and some other ladies. When I was alone, a small white dog, which belonged to one of the gardeners, came towards me and picked me up in his mouth. I had another shock of my life. The dog wagging his tail ran straight to his master and placed me gently near him. By God’s grace it was a pet dog and was very well trained and caused me no harm. Even my clothes were not torn. The gardener knew me very well; he got very worried. Very gently, he took me in his hands and said politely, “Are you all right?”
I had not yet regained my senses, so, could not speak even a word. He then carried me to my nurse who was very angry with the gardener on account of his dog. The gardener begged pardon and the matter was resolved because Glumdalclitch herself was afraid. She knew that the queen would be annoyed if she came to know of the incident. She promised never to leave me alone again.
I had to be very careful about big birds because they caught small animals. Sometimes they tried to catch me too. The smaller birds were not dangerous but one day, a little bird took a piece of cake out of my hand.
But the greatest danger I ever faced in that kingdom was that from a monkey. One day, Glumdalclitch had left the windows and the door of my box open for fresh air to come in. Immediately, someone entered the room and she had to go somewhere. I sat at my table thinking about my family and children. Instantly, I heard something skipping and bouncing about on the road. Once again, I was frightened. I thought of hiding in one of the corners of my room.
Somehow, I gathered some courage and peeped out of the window. I saw a monkey leaping up and down. That huge animal which was the size of a large elephant belonged to one of the servants who lived in the palace. He came close to the window of my box and started peeping in. It would have been much better had I hidden myself under the bed. He kept tweeting and chattering around the box for some time and kept looking at me. Within a fraction of a second he caught hold of my coat and dragged me out of my box. He held me very gently just as a nurse holds a child. Even though he held me tenderly yet I felt uncomfortable. When I struggled a little, he squeezed me so hard that I decided not to resist any more. Now and then, he was stroking my face very gently with his paw. I guessed he thought me to be a young one of his own species.
Just in time, Glumdalclitch returned. As she opened the door, she understood there was something wrong. She traced the sound and peeped out of the window from where the monkey had come in. She saw the monkey which was walking on three legs and holding me in the fourth. By that time, he had climbed up the roof.
At once, Glumdalclich gave out a loud shriek. There was a big noise all round. Within seconds a huge crowd had gathered around. Even the king and the queen arrived at the spot. The servants ran for ladders. Some of people began to throw up stones but the king immediately asked them to stop doing such a thing, lest some stone should hit me.
Many people climbed up the ladders from all sides. Now, the monkey saw that he had been entrapped. Without any delay, he dropped me on the roof and fled away. I was sitting on the slope of the roof which was five hundred feet above the ground. From there even the wind could blow me down. But a young boy, one of my nurse’s servants, climbed up the ladder, put me in his pocket and brought me down safely.
I was terribly shocked and bruised all over my body. I remained in bed for about a fortnight. The king, the queen, and members of the court visited me every day and enquired about my health. The king issued an order that the monkey should be killed and that no such animal should be kept in or around the palace.
After I had recovered, I went to the king to express my thanks for his favours. He was in a nice mood and we had a good discussion about that adventure. He asked me how I felt and what I thought when the monkey was holding me in his paw on the roof. He even wanted to know what I would have done if a similar situation had occurred in my own country. Thereupon, I told the king that there were no monkeys in Europe, except a few which were brought from other places for shows circuses and other forms of entertainment.
Now, I boasted a little to show that I was courageous and brave, and told him, “The monkeys in our country are so small that I could deal with a dozen of them together, if they dared to attack me. Even in case of this huge monkey, I would have given him a big wound if I had my sword around with me at that time.”
Nonetheless, my boasting produced nothing except a loud laughter from the king as well as some members of the court who were sitting there.
