[Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift]@TWC D-Link bookGulliver’s Travels CHAPTER IV 3/6
To satisfy my curious reader, it may be sufficient to describe Lorbrulgrud.
This city stands upon almost two equal parts on each side the river that passes through.
It contains above eighty thousand houses, and about six hundred thousand inhabitants.
It is in length three _glomglungs_ (which make about fifty-four English miles) and two and a half in breadth, as I measured it myself in the royal map made by the king's order, which was laid on the ground on purpose for me, and extended a hundred feet: I paced the diameter and circumference several times barefoot, and, computing by the scale, measured it pretty exactly. The king's palace is no regular edifice, but a heap of buildings, about seven miles round: the chief rooms are generally two hundred and forty feet high, and broad and long in proportion.
A coach was allowed to Glumdalclitch and me, wherein her governess frequently took her out to see the town, or go among the shops; and I was always of the party, carried in my box; although the girl, at my own desire, would often take me out, and hold me in her hand, that I might more conveniently view the houses and the people as we passed along the streets, I reckoned our coach to be about the square of Westminster-hall, but not altogether so high: however, I cannot be very exact. Besides the large box in which I was usually carried, the queen ordered a smaller one to be made for me, of about twelve feet square and ten high, for the convenience of travelling, because the other was somewhat too large for Glumdalclitch's lap, and cumbersome in the coach.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|