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 neceffary 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 fame friendfhip, and mutual benevolence, that they bear to all others of the fame fpecies, who come in their way; without jealoufy, fondness, quarrelling, or difcontent.

In educating the youth of both fexes their method is admirable, and highly deferveth our imitation. These are not fuffered to taste a grain of oats, except upon certain days, till eighteen years old; nor milk, but very rarely; and in fummer they graze two hours in the morning, and as many in the evening, which their parents likewife obferve; but the fervants are not allowed above half that time, and a great part of their grafs is brought home, which they eat at the moft convenient hours, when they can be beft fpared from work.

Temperance, industry, exercife, and cleanliness, are the leffons equally enjoined to the young ones of both fexes: and my master thought it monftrous in us to give the females a different kind of education from the males, except in fome articles of domeftic management; whereby, as he truly obferved, one half of our natives were good for nothing but bringing children into the world: and to truft the care

of

of our children to fuch ufelefs animals, he faid, was yet a greater inftance of brutality.

But the Houyhnhnms train up their youth to ftrength, speed, and hardiness by exercising them in running races up and down fteep hills, and over hard ftony 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 diftrict meet to thew their proficiency in running and leaping, and other feats of ftrength and agility; where the victor is rewarded, with a fong in his or her praife. On this festival the fervants drive a herd of yahoos into the field laden with hay, and oats, and milk, for a repaft to the Houyhnhnms; after which thefe brutes are immediately driven back again, for fear of being noisome to the affembly.

Every fourth year, at the vernal equinox, there is a reprefentative council of the whole nation, which meets in a plain about twenty miles from our houfe, and continueth about five or fix days. Here they enquire into the flate and condition of the feveral diftricts; whether they abound, or be deficient in hay or oats, or cows or yahoos? and wherever there is any want (which is but feldom) it is immediately fupplied by unanimous confent and contribution. Here likewife the regulation of children is fettled as for inftance, if a Houyhnhnm hath two males, he changeth one of them with another that hath two females: and when a child hath been loft by any cafualty, where VOL. II. Bb

the

the mother is past breeding, it is determined. what family in the district shall breed another to supply the loss.

CHAP. IX.

A grand debate at the general affembly of the Houyhnhnms, and how it was determined. The learning of the Houyhnhnms. Their buildings. Their manner of burials. The defectivenefs of their language.

NE of these grand affemblies was held

in my time, about three months before my departure, whither my mafter went as the representative of our diftrict. In this council was refumed their old debate, and indeed the only debate that ever happened in their country; whereof my mafter after his return gave me a very particular account.

The queftion to be debated was, whether the yahoos fhould be exterminated from the face of the earth. One of the members for the affirmative offered feveral arguments of great ftrength and weight; alledging, that as the yahoos were the most filthy, noifome, and deformed animal which nature ever produced, fo they were the most restive and indocible, mischievous and malicious: they would privately fuck the teats of the Houyhnhnms cows; kill and devour their cats, trample down their oats and grafs, if they were not continually watched, and commit a thousand other extravangan

cies. 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 fun upon corrupted mud and flime, or from the ooze and froth of the fea, was never known that thefe yahoos engendered, and their brood in a fhort time grew fo numerous as to over-run and infeft the whole nation that the Houyhnhnms to get rid of this evil made a general hunting, and at laft enclosed the whole herd; and destroying the elder, every Houyhnhnm kept two young ones in a kennel, and brought them to fuch a degree of tameness, as an animal so savage by nature can be capable of acquiring; ufing them for draught and carriage: that there seemed to be much truth in this tradition, and that thofe creatures could not be Yinhniamfhy (or aborigines of the land) because of the violent hatred the Houyhnhnms, as well as all other animals, bore them; which, although their evil difpofition fufficiently deferved, could never have arrived at fo high a degree, if they had been Aborigines; or elfe they would have long fince been rooted out: that the inhabitants, taking a fancy to use the fervice of the yaboos, had very imprudently neg lected to cultivate the breed of affes, which are a comely animal, eafily kept, more tame and orderly, without any offenfive finell, ftrong enough for labour, although they yield to the other in agility of body; and, if their braying Bb a

be

be no agreeable found, it is far preferable to the horrible howlings of the yaboos.

Several others declared their fentiments to the fame purpose, when my master proposed an expedient to the affembly, whereof he had indeed borrowed the hint from me. He approved of the tradition mentioned by the bonourable member, who fpoke before; and affirmed, that the two yaboos, faid to be first feen among them, had been driven thither over the fea; that coming to land, and being forfaken by their companions, they retired to the mountains, and degenerating by degrees, became in procefs of time much more favage, than those of their own fpecies in the country from whence these two originals came. The reafon of this affertion was, that he had now in his poffeffion a certain wonderful yahoo (meaning myfelf) which most of them had heard of and many of them had feen. He then related to them, how he first found me; that my body was all covered with an artificial compofure of the fkins and hairs of other animals: that I fpoke in alanguage of my own, and had thoroughly learned theirs: that I had related to him the accidents, which brought me thither; that, when he faw me without my covering, I was an exact yahoo in every part, only of a whiter colour, lefs hairy, and with shorter claws. He added, how I had endeavoured to perfuade him, that in my own and other countries the yaboos acted as the governing, rational animal, and held the Houyhnhnms in fervitude: that he obferved in me all the qualities of a yahoo, only a little

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