CHAPTER VII.



[The author, being informed of a design to accuse him of high-
treason, makes his escape to Blefuscu. His reception there.]

Before I proceed to give an account of my leaving this kingdom, it
may be proper to inform the reader of a private intrigue which had
been for two months forming against me.

I had been hitherto, all my life, a stranger to courts, for which I
was unqualified by the meanness of my condition. I had indeed
heard and read enough of the dispositions of great princes and
ministers, but never expected to have found such terrible effects
of them, in so remote a country, governed, as I thought, by very
different maxims from those in Europe.

When I was just preparing to pay my attendance on the emperor of
Blefuscu, a considerable person at court (to whom I had been very
serviceable, at a time when he lay under the highest displeasure of
his imperial majesty) came to my house very privately at night, in
a close chair, and, without sending his name, desired admittance.
The chairmen were dismissed; I put the chair, with his lordship in
it, into my coat-pocket: and, giving orders to a trusty servant,
to say I was indisposed and gone to sleep, I fastened the door of
my house, placed the chair on the table, according to my usual
custom, and sat down by it. After the common salutations were