Gulliver's Travels | Chapter VII
Chapter VII
The Author, being informed of a design to accuse him of high treason, makes his escape to Blefuscu. His reception there.
BEFORE I PROCEED to give an account of my leaving this kingdom it may be proper to inform the reader of a private intrigue which had been for two months forming against me.
I had been hitherto all my life a stranger to courts, for which I was unqualified by the meanness of my condition. I had, indeed, heard and read enough of the dispositions of great Princes and ministers, but never expected to have found such terrible effects of them in so remote a country, governed, as I thought, by very different maxims from those in Europe.
When I was just preparing to pay my attendance on the Emperor of Blefuscu, a considerable person at court (to whom I had been very serviceable at a time when he lay under the highest displeasure of his Imperial Majesty) came to my house very privately at night in a close chair, and, without sending his name, desired admittance. The chairmen were dismissed; I put the chair, with his lordship in it, into my coat pocket; and, giving orders to a trusty servant to say I was indisposed and gone to sleep, I fastened the door of my house, placed the chair on the table, according to my usual custom, and sat down by it. After the common salutations were over, observing his lordship's countenance full of concern, and inquiring into the reason, he desired I would hear him with patience in a matter that highly concerned my honor and my life. His speech was to the following effect, for I took notes of it as soon as he left me.
“You are to know,” said he, “that several committees of council have been lately called in the most private manner on your account; and it is but two days since his Majesty came to a full resolution.
“You are very sensible that Skyresh Bolgolam” (galbet, or high admiral) hath been your mortal enemy almost ever since your arrival; his original reasons I know not; but his hatred is increased since your great success against Blefuscu, by which his glory as admiral is much obscured. This lord, in conjunction with Flimnap, the high treasurer, whose enmity against you is notorious on account of his lady, Limtoc, the general, Lalcon, the chamberlain, and Balmuff, the grand justiciary, have prepared articles of impeachment against you for treason and other capital crimes.”
This preface made me so impatient, being conscious of my own merits and innocence, that I was going to interrupt, when he entreated me to be silent, and thus proceeded:
“Out of gratitude for the favors you have done me I procured information of the whole proceedings, and a copy of the articles, wherein I venture my head for your service.
“‘Articles of Impeachment against QUINBUS FLESTRIN, (the MAN-MOUNTAIN)
“ ‘Article I
“‘whereas, by a statute made in the reign of his Imperial Majest Calin Deffar Plune, it is enacted, that whoever shall make water within the precincts of the royal palace, shall be liable to the pains and penalties of high-treason: notwithstanding, the said Quinbus Flestrin, in open breech of the said law, under color of extinguishing the fire kindled in the apartment of his Majesty's most dear Imperial Consort, did maliciously, traitorously, and devilishly, by discharge of urine, put out the said fire kindled in the said apartment, lying and being within the precincts of the said royal palace; against the statute in that case provided, etc. against the duty, etc.
“ ‘Article II
“‘That the said Quinbus Flestrin having brought the imperial fleet of Blefuscu into the royal port, and being afterward commanded by his Imperial Majesty to seize all the other ships of the said empire of Blefuscu and reduce that empire to a province, to be governed by a viceroy from hence, and to destroy and put to death not only all the Big-endian exiles, but likewise all the people of that empire who would not immediately forsake the Big-endian heresy: he, the said Flestrin, like a false traitor against his most auspicious, serene, Imperial Majesty, did petition to be excused from the said service, upon pretense of unwillingness to force the consciences or destroy the liberties and lives of innocent people.
“ ‘Article III
“‘That, whereas certain ambassadors arrived from the court of Blefuscu to sue for peace in his Majesty's court; he, the said Flestrin, did, like a false traitor, aid, abet, comfort, and divert the said ambassadors, although he knew them to be servants to a Prince who was lately an open enemy to his Imperial Majesty, and in an open war against his said Majesty.
“ ‘Article IV
“‘That the said Quinbus Flestrin, contrary to the duty of a faithful subject, is now preparing to make a voyage to the court and empire of Blefuscu, for which he hath received only verbal license from his Imperial Majesty; and under color of the said license doth falsely and traitorously intend to take the said voyage, and thereby to aid, comfort, and abet the Emperor of Blefuscu, so late an enemy, and in open war with his Imperial Majesty aforesaid.’
“There are some other articles, but these are the most important, of which I have read you an abstract.
“In the several debates upon this impeachment it must be confessed that his Majesty gave many marks of his great lenity, often urging the services you had done him and endeavoring to extenuate your crimes. The treasurer and admiral insisted that you should be put to the most painful and ignominious death, by setting fire to your house at night, and the general was to attend with twenty thousand men armed with poisoned arrows, to shoot you on the face and hands. Some of your servants were to have private orders to strew a poisonous juice in your shirts and sheets, which would soon make you tear your own flesh and die in the utmost torture. The general came into the same opinion; so that for a long time there was a majority against you; but his Majesty, resolving, if possible, to spare your life, at last brought off the chamberlain.
“Upon this incident, Reldresal, principal secretary for private affairs, who always approved himself your true friend, was commanded by the Emperor to deliver his opinion, which he accordingly did; and therein justified the good thoughts you have of him. He allowed your crimes to be great, but that still there was room for mercy, the most commendable virtue in a Prince, and for which his Majesty was so justly celebrated. He said the friendship between you and him was so well known to the world that perhaps the most honorable board might think him partial. However, in obedience to the command he had received, he would freely offer his sentiments. That if his Majesty, in consideration of your services, and pursuant to his own merciful disposition, would please to spare your life, and only give order to put out both your eyes, he humbly conceived that, by this expedient, justice might in some measure be satisfied, and all the world would applaud the lenity of the Emperor as well as the fair and generous proceedings of those who have the honor to be his counselors. That the loss of your eyes would be no impediment to your bodily strength, by which you might still be useful to his Majesty. That blindness is an addition to courage, by concealing dangers from us; that the fear you had for your eyes was the greatest difficulty in bringing over the enemy's fleet, and it would be sufficient for you to see by the eyes of the ministers, since the greatest Princes do no more.
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