Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 5.djvu/211

No. 50. . But we soon perceived these two were great enemies to one another, and did not always agree in the same story. We could make shift to gather out of one of them, that this island was very much infested with a monstrous kind of animals, in the shape of men, called whigs; and he often told us, that he hoped we should meet with none of them in our way, for that, if we did, they would be apt to knock us down, for being kings.

"Our other interpeterinterpreter [sic] used to talk very much of a kind of animal called a tory, that was as great a monster as the whig, and would treat us ill for being foreigners. These two creatures, it seems, are born with a secret antipathy to one another, and engage when they meet as naturally as the elephant and the rhinoceros. But, as we saw none of either of these species, we are apt to think that our guides deceived us with misrepresentations and fictions, and amused us with an account of such monsters as are not really in their country. These particulars we made a shift to pick out from the discourse of our interpreters; which we put together as well as we could, being able to understand but here and there a word of what they said, and afterward making up the meaning of it among ourselves. The men of the country are very cunning and ingenious in handicraft works, but withal so very idle, that we often saw young lusty rawboned fellows carried up and down the streets in little covered rooms by a couple of porters, who are hired for that service. Their dress is likewise very barbarous; for they almost strangle themselves about " the