IVIt was not long before I communicated to his Majesty the plan I
formed for seizing the enemy’s whole fleet. The Empire of
Blefuscu is an island parted from Lilliput only by a channel eight
hundred yards wide. I consulted the most experienced seamen
on the depth of the channel, and they told me that in the middle,
at high water, it was seventy glumguffs (about six feet of European
measure). I walked toward the coast, where, lying down behind
a hillock, I took out my spy-glass, and viewed the enemy’s fleet at
anchor— about fifty men-of-war, and other vessels. I then
came back to my house and gave orders for a great quantity of the
strongest cables and bars of iron. The cable was about as
thick as packthread, and the bars of the length and size of a
knitting-needle. I treb
