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. I answered  that ourhorses were trained up, from three or four years old, to the several uses we intended them for; that if any ofthem proved intolerably vicious, they were employed for carriages; that they were severely beaten, while theywere young, for any mischievous tricks; that the males, designed for the common use of riding or draught,were generally castrated about two years after their birth, to take down their spirits, and make them more tameand gentle; that they were indeed sensible of rewards and punishments; but his honour would please toconsider, that they had not the least tincture of reason, any more than the Yahoos in this country.It put me to the pains of many circumlocutions, to give my master a right idea of what I spoke; for theirlanguage does not abound in variety of words, because their wants and passions are fewer than among us.Butit is impossible to express his noble resentment at our savage treatment of the Houyhnhnm race; particularlyafter I had explained the manner and use of castrating horses among us, to hinder them from propagating theirkind, and to render them more servile.He said,  if it were possible there could be any country where Yahoosalone were endued with reason, they certainly must be the governing animal; because reason in time willalways prevail against brutal strength.But, considering the frame of our bodies, and especially of mine, hethought no creature of equal bulk was so ill-contrived for employing that reason in the common offices oflife; whereupon he desired to know whether those among whom I lived resembled me, or the Yahoos of hiscountry? I assured him,  that I was as well shaped as most of my age; but the younger, and the females,were much more soft and tender, and the skins of the latter generally as white as milk. He said,  I differedindeed from other Yahoos, being much more cleanly, and not altogether so deformed; but, in point of realadvantage, he thought I differed for the worse: that my nails were of no use either to my fore or hinder feet; asto my fore feet, he could not properly call them by that name, for he never observed me to walk upon them;that they were too soft to bear the ground; that I generally went with them uncovered; neither was thecovering I sometimes wore on them of the same shape, or so strong as that on my feet behind: that I could notwalk with any security, for if either of my hinder feet slipped, I must inevitably fail. He then began to findfault with other parts of my body:  the flatness of my face, the prominence of my nose, mine eyes placeddirectly in front, so that I could not look on either side without turning my head: that I was not able to feedmyself, without lifting one of my fore-feet to my mouth: and therefore nature had placed those joints toanswer that necessity.He knew not what could be the use of those several clefts and divisions in my feetbehind; that these were too soft to bear the hardness and sharpness of stones, without a covering made fromthe skin of some other brute; that my whole body wanted a fence against heat and cold, which I was forced toput on and off every day, with tediousness and trouble: and lastly, that he observed every animal in thiscountry naturally to abhor the Yahoos, whom the weaker avoided, and the stronger drove from them.So that,supposing us to have the gift of reason, he could not see how it were possible to cure that natural antipathy,which every creature discovered against us; nor consequently how we could tame and render themserviceable.However, he would, as he said,  debate the matter no farther, because he was more desirous toknow my own story, the country where I was born, and the several actions and events of my life, before Icame hither.I assured him,  how extremely desirous I was that he should be satisfied on every point; but I doubted much,whether it would be possible for me to explain myself on several subjects, whereof his honour could have noconception; because I saw nothing in his country to which I could resemble them; that, however, I would domy best, and strive to express myself by similitudes, humbly desiring his assistance when I wanted properwords; which he was pleased to promise me.I said,  my birth was of honest parents, in an island called England; which was remote from his country, asmany days' journey as the strongest of his honour's servants could travel in the annual course of the sun; that ICHAPTER IV.101Gulliver's Travelswas bred a surgeon, whose trade it is to cure wounds and hurts in the body, gotten by accident or violence;that my country was governed by a female man, whom we called queen; that I left it to get riches, whereby Imight maintain myself and family, when I should return; that, in my last voyage, I was commander of theship, and had about fifty Yahoos under me, many of which died at sea, and I was forced to supply them byothers picked out from several nations; that our ship was twice in danger of being sunk, the first time by agreat storm, and the second by striking against a rock. Here my master interposed, by asking me,  how Icould persuade strangers, out of different countries, to venture with me, after the losses I had sustained, andthe hazards I had run? I said,  they were fellows of desperate fortunes, forced to fly from the places of theirbirth on account of their poverty or their crimes.Some were undone by lawsuits; others spent all they had indrinking, whoring, and gaming; others fled for treason; many for murder, theft, poisoning, robbery, perjury,forgery, coining false money, for committing rapes, or sodomy; for flying from their colours, or deserting tothe enemy; and most of them had broken prison; none of these durst return to their native countries, for fear ofbeing hanged, or of starving in a jail; and therefore they were under the necessity of seeking a livelihood inother places.During this discourse, my master was pleased to interrupt me several times.I had made use of manycircumlocutions in describing to him the nature of the several crimes for which most of our crew had beenforced to fly their country.This labour took up several days' conversation, before he was able to comprehendme.He was wholly at a loss to know what could be the use or necessity of practising those vices.To clear upwhich, I endeavoured to give some ideas of the desire of power and riches; of the terrible effects of lust,intemperance, malice, and envy.All this I was forced to define and describe by putting cases and makingsuppositions.After which, like one whose imagination was struck with something never seen or heard ofbefore, he would lift up his eyes with amazement and indignation.Power, government, war, law, punishment,and a thousand other things, had no terms wherein that language could express them, which made thedifficulty almost insuperable, to give my master any conception of what I meant [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]