Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World
real _Yahoo_ in every limb and feature, since the females had a natural
propensity to me, as one of their own species. Neither was the hair of
this brute of a red colour (which might have been some excuse for an
appetite a little irregular), but black as a sloe, and her countenance
did not make an appearance altogether so hideous as the rest of her
kind; for I think she could not be above eleven years old.
Having lived three years in this country, the reader, I suppose, will
expect that I should, like other travellers, give him some account of
the manners and customs of its inhabitants, which it was indeed my
principal study to learn.
As these noble _Houyhnhnms_ are endowed by nature with a general
disposition to all virtues, and have no conceptions or ideas of what is
evil in a rational creature, so their grand maxim is, to cultivate
reason, and to be wholly governed by it. Neither is reason among them a
point problematical, as with us, where men can argue with plausibility
on both sides of the question, but strikes you with immediate
conviction; as it must needs do, where it is not mingled, obscured, or
discoloured, by passion and interest. I remember it was with extreme
difficulty that I could bring my master to understand the meaning of
the word opinion, or how a point could be disputable; because reason
taught us to affirm or deny only where we are certain; and beyond our
knowledge we cannot do either. So that controversies, wranglings,
disputes, and positiveness, in false or dubious propositions, are evils
unknown among the _Houyhnhnms_. In the like manner, when I used to
explain to him our several systems of natural philosophy, he would
laugh, “that a creature pretending to reason, should value itself upon
the knowledge of other people’s conjectures, and in things where that
knowledge, if it were certain, could be of no use.” Wherein he agreed
entirely with the sentiments of Socrates, as Plato delivers them; which
I mention as the highest honour I can do that prince of philosophers. I
have often since reflected, what destruction such doctrine would make
in the libraries of Europe; and how many paths of fame would be then
shut up in the learned world.
Friendship and benevolence are the two principal virtues among the
_Houyhnhnms_; and these not confined to particular objects, but
universal to the whole race; for a stranger from the remotest part is
equally treated with the nearest neighbour, and wherever he goes, looks
upon himself as at home. They preserve decency and civility in the
highest degrees, but are altogether ignorant of ceremony. They have no
fondness for their colts or foals, but the care they take in educating
them proceeds entirely from the dictates of reason. And I observed my
master to show the same affection to his neighbour’s issue, that he had
for his own. They will have it that nature teaches them to love the
whole species, and it is reason only that makes a distinction of
persons, where there is a superior degree of virtue.
When the matron _Houyhnhnms_ have produced one of each sex, they no
longer accompany with their consorts, except they lose one of their
issue by some casualty, which very seldom happens; but in such a case
they meet again; or when the like accident befalls a person whose wife
is past bearing, some other couple bestow on him one of their own
colts, and then go together again until the mother is pregnant. This
caution is necessary, to prevent the country from being overburdened
with numbers. But the race of inferior _Houyhnhnms_, bred up to be
servants, is not so strictly limited upon this article: these are
allowed to produce three of each sex, to be domestics in the noble
families.
In their marriages, they are exactly careful to choose such colours as
will not make any disagreeable mixture in the breed. Strength is
chiefly valued in the male, and comeliness in the female; not upon the
account of love, but to preserve the race from degenerating; for where
a female happens to excel in strength, a consort is chosen, with regard
to comeliness.
Courtship, love, presents, jointures, settlements have no place in
their thoughts, or terms whereby to express them in their language. The
young couple meet, and are joined, merely because it is the
determination of their parents and friends; it is what they see done
every day, and they look upon it as one of the necessary actions of a
reasonable being. But the violation of marriage, or any other
unchastity, was never heard of; and the married pair pass their lives
with the same friendship and mutual benevolence, that they bear to all
others of the same species who come in their way, without jealousy,
fondness, quarrelling, or discontent.
In educating the youth of both sexes, their method is admirable, and
highly deserves our imitation. These are not suffered to taste a grain
of oats, except upon certain days, till eighteen years old; nor milk,
but very rarely; and in summer they graze two hours in the morning, and
as many in the evening, which their parents likewise observe; but the
servants are not allowed above half that time, and a great part of
their grass is brought home, which they eat at the most convenient
hours, when they can be best spared from work.
Temperance, industry, exercise, and cleanliness, are the lessons
equally enjoined to the young ones of both sexes: and my master thought
it monstrous in us, to give the females a different kind of education
from the males, except in some articles of domestic management;
whereby, as he truly observed, one half of our natives were good for
nothing but bringing children into the world; and to trust the care of
our children to such useless animals, he said, was yet a greater
instance of brutality.
But the _Houyhnhnms_ train up their youth to strength, speed, and
hardiness, by exercising them in running races up and down steep hills,
and over hard stony grounds; and when they are all in a sweat, they are
ordered to leap over head and ears into a pond or river. Four times a
year the youth of a certain district meet to show their proficiency in
running and leaping, and other feats of strength and agility; where the
victor is rewarded with a song in his or her praise. On this festival,
the servants drive a herd of _Yahoos_ into the field, laden with hay,
and oats, and milk, for a repast to the _Houyhnhnms_; after which,
these brutes are immediately driven back again, for fear of being
noisome to the assembly.
Every fourth year, at the vernal equinox, there is a representative
council of the whole nation, which meets in a plain about twenty miles
from our house, and continues about five or six days. Here they inquire
into the state and condition of the several districts; whether they
abound or be deficient in hay or oats, or cows, or _Yahoos_; and
wherever there is any want (which is but seldom) it is immediately
supplied by unanimous consent and contribution. Here likewise the
regulation of children is settled: as for instance, if a _Houyhnhnm_
has two males, he changes one of them with another that has two
females; and when a child has been lost by any casualty, where the
mother is past breeding, it is determined what family in the district
shall breed another to supply the loss.
CHAPTER IX.
A grand debate at the general assembly of the _Houyhnhnms_, and how it
was determined. The learning of the _Houyhnhnms_. Their buildings.
Their manner of burials. The defectiveness of their language.
One of these grand assemblies was held in my time, about three months
before my departure, whither my master went as the representative of
our district. In this council was resumed their old debate, and indeed
the only debate that ever happened in their country; whereof my master,
after his return, gave me a very particular account.
The question to be debated was, “whether the _Yahoos_ should be
exterminated from the face of the earth?” One of the members for the
affirmative offered several arguments of great strength and weight,
alleging, “that as the _Yahoos_ were the most filthy, noisome, and
deformed animals which nature ever produced, so they were the most
restive and indocible, mischievous and malicious; they would privately
suck the teats of the _Houyhnhnms’_ cows, kill and devour their cats,
trample down their oats and grass, if they were not continually
watched, and commit a thousand other extravagancies.” He took notice of
a general tradition, “that _Yahoos_ had not been always in their
country; but that many ages ago, two of these brutes appeared together
upon a mountain; whether produced by the heat of the sun upon corrupted
mud and slime, or from the ooze and froth of the sea, was never known;
that these _Yahoos_ engendered, and their brood, in a short time, grew
so numerous as to overrun and infest the whole nation; that the
_Houyhnhnms_, to get rid of this evil, made a general hunting, and at
last enclosed the whole herd; and destroying the elder, every
_Houyhnhnm_ kept two young ones in a kennel, and brought them to such a
degree of tameness, as an animal, so savage by nature, can be capable
of acquiring, using them for draught and carriage; that there seemed to
be much truth in this tradition, and that those creatures could not be
_yinhniamshy_ (or _aborigines_ of the land), because of the violent
hatred the _Houyhnhnms_, as well as all other animals, bore them,
which, although their evil disposition sufficiently deserved, could
never have arrived at so high a degree if they had been _aborigines_,
or else they would have long since been rooted out; that the
inhabitants, taking a fancy to use the service of the _Yahoos_, had,
very imprudently, neglected to cultivate the breed of asses, which are
a comely animal, easily kept, more tame and orderly, without any
offensive smell, strong enough for labour, although they yield to the
other in agility of body, and if their braying be no agreeable sound,
it is far preferable to the horrible howlings of the _Yahoos_.”
Several others declared their sentiments to the same purpose, when my
master proposed an expedient to the assembly, whereof he had indeed
borrowed the hint from me. “He approved of the tradition mentioned by
the honourable member who spoke before, and affirmed, that the two
_Yahoos_ said to be seen first among them, had been driven thither over
the sea; that coming to land, and being forsaken by their companions,
they retired to the mountains, and degenerating by degrees, became in
process of time much more savage than those of their own species in the
country whence these two originals came. The reason of this assertion
was, that he had now in his possession a certain wonderful _Yahoo_
(meaning myself) which most of them had heard of, and many of them had
seen. He then related to them how he first found me; that my body was
all covered with an artificial composure of the skins and hairs of
other animals; that I spoke in a language of my own, and had thoroughly
learned theirs; that I had related to him the accidents which brought
me thither; that when he saw me without my covering, I was an exact
_Yahoo_ in every part, only of a whiter colour, less hairy, and with
shorter claws. He added, how I had endeavoured to persuade him, that in
my own and other countries, the _Yahoos_ acted as the governing,
rational animal, and held the _Houyhnhnms_ in servitude; that he
observed in me all the qualities of a _Yahoo_, only a little more
civilized by some tincture of reason, which, however, was in a degree
as far inferior to the _Houyhnhnm_ race, as the _Yahoos_ of their
country were to me; that, among other things, I mentioned a custom we
had of castrating _Houyhnhnms_ when they were young, in order to render
them tame; that the operation was easy and safe; that it was no shame