ced to
move with extreme difficulty, for the stalks of the corn were sometimes
not above a foot distant, so that I could hardly squeeze my body betwixt
them. However, I made a shift to go forward till I came to a part of the
field where the corn had been laid by the rain and wind. Here it was
impossible for me to advance a step; for the stalks were so interwoven
that I could not creep through, and the beards of the fallen ears so
strong and pointed that they pierced through my clothes into my flesh.
At the same time I heard the reapers not above an hundred yards behind
me. Being quite dispirited with toil, and wholly overcome by grief and
despair, I lay down between two ridges, and heartily wished I might
there end my days. I bemoaned my desolate widow and fatherless children.
I lamented my own folly and willfulness in attempting a second voyage,
against the advice of all my friends and relations. In this terrible
agitation of mind I could not forbear thinking of Lilliput, whose
inhabitants looked upon me as the greatest prodigy that ever appeared in
the world; where I was able to draw an imperial fleet in my hand, and
perform those other actions which will be recorded forever in the
chronicles of that empire, while posterity shall hardly believe them,
although attested by millions. I reflected what a mortification it must
prove to me to appear as inconsiderable in this nation as one single
Lilliputian would be among us. But this I conceived was to be the least
of my misfortunes; for, as human creatures are observed to be more
savage and cruel in proportion to their bulk, what could I expect but to
be a morsel in the mouth of the first among these enormous barbarians
that should happen to seize me? Undoubtedly philosophers are in the
right when they tell us that nothing is great or little otherwise than
by comparison. It might have pleased fortune to let the Lilliputians
find some nation, where the people were as diminutive with respect to
them as they were to me. And who knows but that even this prodigious
race of mortals might be equally overmatched in some distant part of the
world, whereof we have yet no discovery.

Scared and confounded as I was, I could not forbear going on with these
reflections, when one of the reapers, approaching within ten yards of
the ridge where I lay, made me apprehend that with the next step I
should be squashed to death under his foot, or cut in two with his
reaping-hook. And therefore w