Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/519

Rh his description of it, disgusting as it is, is not in the least exaggerated. At first sight they had so little resemblance to any thing human, that Gulliver mistook them for some new species of cattle belonging to the inhabitants. After having given a description of them as they appeared to him when he first saw a number of them near him, where he lay concealed behind a thicket, in order to mark their form more distinctly, he says, "So that thinking I had seen enough, full of contempt and aversion, I got up and pursued the beaten road, hoping it might direct me to the cabin of some Indian. I had not got far, when I met one of these creatures, full in my way, and coming up directly to me. The ugly monster, when he saw me, distorted several ways every feature of his visage, and started as at an object he had never seen before; then approaching nearer, lifted up his fore paw, whether out of curiosity or mischief, I could not tell: but I drew my hanger, and gave him a good blow with the flat side of it, for I durst not strike with the edge, fearing the inhabitants might be provoked against me, if they should come to know that I had killed or maimed any of their cattle." And it was not till afterward, when he had an opportunity of examining one of them more closely in his kennel, that he perceived its resemblance to the human figure. But it may be asked, to what end has such an odious animal been produced to view? The answer is obvious: The design of the author, in the whole of this apologue, is, to place before the eyes of man a picture of the two different parts of his frame, detached from each other, in order that he may the better estimate the true value of each, and Rh