Gulliver's Travels: Adventures in the Land of Giants

A fierce monsoon storm of terrible violence drove our vessel thousands of leagues off course across uncharted oceans. When the tempest finally subsided, our captain sent a longboat ashore on a mountainous coastline to search for fresh drinking water. Being eager to explore the unknown territory, I wandered alone inland along a wide, dusty roadway.

To my utter astonishment, I noticed that the grass beside the road was nearly twenty feet high, and the surrounding barley fields rose forty feet into the sky! As I reached a massive wooden stile, I saw a colossal creature approaching across the field—a human giant as tall as a church steeple, taking ten yards at every stride!

Paralyzed with terror, I hid in the thick barley, but the giant's farm laborers soon arrived with enormous scythes to reap the crop. When one of the giants reached down to grasp a sheaf of wheat, he spotted me trembling on the ground. He picked me up between his thumb and forefinger, lifting me sixty feet into the air to examine me with curious eyes.

I clasped my hands together, bowed low, and spoke in the most polite and humble English I could muster. The giant farmer was delighted by my miniature stature and gentle manners. Wrapping me carefully in his handkerchief, he carried me home to his farmhouse in the kingdom of Brobdingnag.

At dinner, the farmer placed me on a high table spread with roasted meats the size of ox-carcasses. The farmer's wife shrieked with fright at first, mistaking me for a toad, but soon marvelled as I walked gracefully across the tablecloth, drew my miniature sword to salute her, and drank a tiny thimble of cider to her good health.

However, life in the land of giants was fraught with perilous hazards for a man of my diminutive scale. During dinner, the family cat—an immense feline three times the size of an English ox—leaped onto the table and stared at me with hungry eyes. I drew my sword bravely and stood my ground until the beast lost interest.

A few moments later, the farmer's unruly one-year-old child seized me in his chubby fist and stuffed my entire head into his mouth! Had the mother not caught him immediately, I should have been swallowed whole like a sugar plum.

The farmer had a gentle, nine-year-old daughter named Glumdalclitch, who stood barely forty feet high. She became my devoted nurse, protector, and guardian. She constructed a cozy cradle for me in a wooden doll's box, sewed miniature shirts for me from fine linen, and taught me the language of Brobdingnag with infinite patience.

Word of the miraculous miniature man spread throughout the province, and the greedy farmer began exhibiting me in market towns for silver coins. I was forced to perform tricks, bow, and recite speeches fifty times a day until my health began to fail from sheer exhaustion.

Fortunately, news of my existence reached the royal court in the capital city of Lorbrulgrud. The Queen of Brobdingnag was so enchanted by my intelligence and polite manners that she purchased me from the farmer for a thousand gold pieces, appointing Glumdalclitch as my official royal caretaker.

At court, the Queen's carpenter built me a magnificent wooden traveling box, sixteen feet square, equipped with soft padded walls, sash windows, and miniature furniture bolted to the floor to protect me during travels. I had my own silver dinner service and dined regularly at the Queen's left hand.

Yet court life presented its own ridiculous dangers. The Queen's royal dwarf, who was a mere thirty feet tall and jealous of my popularity, dropped a giant ripe apple from a tree right onto my back, knocking me flat. On another occasion, a mischievous royal monkey seized me from my box, carried me to the palace roof, and attempted to feed me mashed food from its cheek pouch until palace guards rescued me with tall ladders.

The King of Brobdingnag, a wise and philosophical monarch, loved to engage me in long conversations regarding European politics, government, and society. I proudly described the British Parliament, our mighty naval fleets, our complex legal system, and our centuries of glorious warfare.

The King listened with grave attention, stroking his great beard. At last, he took me into his hand and laughed with quiet sorrow. 'My little friend,' he said, 'you have made a most admirable panegyric upon your country. But from all you have told me, I must conclude that the bulk of your natives are the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth.'

I was deeply humbled by his philosophical wisdom. When I offered to teach him the secret formula for gunpowder and cannons—explaining how he could easily destroy rebel armies and become absolute master of his kingdom—the King recoiled in horror, commanding me on pain of death never to mention such murderous inventions again.

I lived in Brobdingnag for two years, treated with immense kindness by the royal family, yet longing desperately to return to men of my own size and stature. My deliverance arrived in the most extraordinary and unexpected fashion.

While accompanying the royal court on a seaside progress along the southern coast, my traveling box was placed upon a rocky promontory by a servant so I could enjoy the fresh sea breeze. Glumdalclitch had stepped away to fetch some tea.

Suddenly, an immense sea eagle swooped down from the clouds, gripped the iron ring on the roof of my box in its gigantic talons, and soared high into the sky! The eagle flew miles out to sea, chased by two other predatory birds. During their aerial battle, the eagle dropped my box, and I plunged hundreds of feet straight down into the deep blue ocean with a tremendous splash!

The wooden box was well-caulked and floated upon the waves like a buoyant ship. Hours later, an English merchant vessel returning from China spotted the strange floating chest and hauled it aboard. The sailors were flabbergasted when I emerged from my box, speaking in a thunderous shout as if they were giants! Returning home to my loving wife and children in England, I looked upon my fellow countrymen with newfound appreciation, having learned the profound relativity of human pride, power, and wisdom.