Flanflasnic
Flanflasnic is a city within the kingdom of Brobdingnag, situated near the sea coast. It is the location of a royal palace where the King of Brobdingnag and his court stay during their progresses to the frontiers. The city lies within eighteen English miles of the sea, making it the closest point of access to the ocean in that part of the kingdom.
The King's Progress and Glumdalclitch's Illness
During a royal progress to the south coast of Brobdingnag, the king decided to pass a few days at his palace near Flanflasnic. Lemuel Gulliver and his nurse, Glumdalclitch, accompanied the court on this journey. Both were much fatigued by the travel; Gulliver had gotten a small cold, but Glumdalclitch was so ill that she was confined to her chamber. Gulliver, longing to see the ocean—which he believed would be the only scene of his escape, if ever it should happen—pretended to be worse than he really was and desired leave to take the fresh air of the sea with a page whom he was very fond of and who had sometimes been trusted with him. Glumdalclitch consented with great unwillingness, giving the page a strict charge to be careful of Gulliver, and bursting into a flood of tears as if she had some foreboding of what was to happen.
The Eagle's Attack and Gulliver's Escape
The page took Gulliver out in his travelling box about half an hour's walk from the palace towards the rocks on the sea-shore. Gulliver ordered him to set the box down, lifted up one of its sashes, and cast many a wistful melancholy look towards the sea. Feeling unwell, he told the page he had a mind to take a nap in his hammock, which he hoped would do him good. He got in, and the boy shut the window close down to keep out the cold. Gulliver soon fell asleep. While he slept, the page, thinking no danger could happen, went among the rocks to look for birds' eggs. Gulliver was suddenly awaked with a violent pull upon the ring fastened at the top of his box for the convenience of carriage. He felt his box raised very high in the air and then borne forward with prodigious speed. The first jolt nearly shook him out of his hammock, but afterwards the motion was easy enough. Looking towards his windows, he could see nothing but the clouds and sky. He heard a noise just over his head like the clapping of wings, and then began to perceive his woeful condition: some eagle had got the ring of his box in its beak, with an intent to let it fall on a rock like a tortoise in a shell, and then pick out his body and devour it. In a little time, the noise and flutter of wings increased very fast, and his box was tossed up and down like a sign in a windy day. He heard several bangs or buffets given to the eagle, and then all of a sudden felt himself falling perpendicularly down for above a minute with such incredible swiftness that he almost lost his breath. His fall was stopped by a terrible squash that sounded louder to his ears than the cataract of Niagara. He then perceived he was fallen into the sea. The box, by the weight of his body, the goods that were in it, and the broad plates of iron fixed for strength at the four corners of the top and bottom, floated about five feet deep in the water. Gulliver supposed that the eagle which flew away with his box was pursued by two or three others and forced to let him drop while it defended itself against the rest, who hoped to share in the prey.
Rescue and Return to England
After some time adrift in the sea, Gulliver's box was discovered by an English merchant ship under the command of Captain Thomas Wilcocks. The captain, spying the box through his glass, sent out his long-boat to investigate. His men returned in a fright, swearing they had seen a swimming-house. The captain himself went in the boat, rowed around the box, discovered two staples on one side, and fastened a cable to one of them, towing the chest towards the ship. When it was alongside, he gave directions to fasten another cable to the ring fixed in the cover and to raise the chest with pulleys. The sailors saw Gulliver's stick and handkerchief thrust out of a hole and concluded that some unhappy man must be shut up in the cavity. The carpenter sawed a passage about four feet square, let down a small ladder, and Gulliver mounted into the ship in a very weak condition. The captain, an honest, worthy Shropshire man, observing Gulliver ready to faint, took him into his cabin, gave him a cordial to comfort him, and made him turn in upon his own bed. Gulliver slept some hours, and upon waking found himself much recovered. The captain ordered supper immediately, and when they were left alone, Gulliver gave him a faithful relation of his travels from the last time he left England to the moment the captain first discovered him. The captain, who had some tincture of learning and very good sense, was immediately convinced of Gulliver's candor and veracity. The voyage was very prosperous, and they arrived in the Downs on the third day of June, 1706, about nine months after Gulliver's escape from Brobdingnag. The captain refused any payment for freight, and Gulliver, having borrowed five shillings for a horse and guide, returned to his house in Redriff, where his strange behavior—bending down to enter doors, stooping lower than his wife's knees, and trying to take up his daughter with one hand by the waist—convinced his family that he had lost his wits, until they came to a right understanding.
