Gulliver's departure from Blefuscu

Gulliver's departure from Blefuscu marks the climax of his first voyage and his definitive break with the Lilliputian court. After discovering a conspiracy to blind and starve him, he seizes a chance opportunity to leave both empires behind, constructing a boat from salvaged materials and setting sail on September 24, 1701. The event transforms a diplomatic mission into a desperate escape, resolves the political tensions of the Lilliput-Blefuscu conflict, and returns Gulliver to England with tangible proof of his adventures.

Discovery of the Boat and Decision to Leave

Three days after his arrival in Blefuscu, Gulliver walked out of curiosity to the northeast coast of the island and observed, about half a league off in the sea, something that looked like a boat overturned. He pulled off his shoes and stockings, waded two or three hundred yards, and found the object approaching nearer by force of the tide; he then plainly saw it to be a real boat, which he supposed might by some tempest have been driven from a ship. Returning immediately towards the city, he desired the Emperor of Blefuscu to lend him twenty of the tallest vessels he had left after the loss of his fleet, and three thousand seamen under the command of his vice-admiral. This fleet sailed round while Gulliver went back the shortest way to the coast where he first discovered the boat. He found the tide had driven it still nearer. The seamen were all provided with cordage, which Gulliver had beforehand twisted to a sufficient strength. When the ships came up, he stripped himself and waded till he came within a hundred yards of the boat, after which he was forced to swim till he got up to it. The seamen threw him the end of the cord, which he fastened to a hole in the forepart of the boat, and the other end to a man-of-war. But he found all his labor to little purpose; for, being out of his depth, he was not able to work. In this necessity, he was forced to swim behind and push the boat forwards as often as he could with one of his hands, and, the tide favoring him, he advanced so far that he could just hold up his chin and feel the ground. He rested two or three minutes, and then gave the boat another shove, and so on till the sea was no higher than his arm-pits; and now, the most laborious part being over, he took out his other cables, which were stowed in one of the ships, and fastened them first to the boat and then to nine of the vessels which attended him; the wind being favorable, the seamen towed, and he shoved, till they arrived within forty yards of the shore. Waiting till the tide was out, he got dry to the boat, and, by the assistance of two thousand men, with ropes and engines, he made a shift to turn it on its bottom and found it was but little damaged.

Preparation of the Vessel and the Emperor's Response

Gulliver then faced the difficulties of getting his boat to the royal port of Blefuscu, which he accomplished by the help of certain paddles that cost him ten days making. A mighty concourse of people appeared upon his arrival, full of wonder at the sight of so prodigious a vessel. He told the Emperor of Blefuscu that his good fortune had thrown this boat in his way, to carry him to some place from whence he might return into his native country, and begged his majesty's orders for getting materials to fit it up, together with his license to depart, which, after some kind expostulation, the emperor was pleased to grant. During all this time, Gulliver wondered not to have heard of any express relating to him from the Emperor of Lilliput to the court of Blefuscu. He was afterwards given privately to understand that the Emperor of Lilliput, never imagining he had the least notice of his designs, believed he was only gone to Blefuscu in performance of his promise according to the license he had given him, which was well known at the Lilliputian court, and would return in a few days when the ceremony was ended. But the Emperor of Lilliput was at last in pain at Gulliver's long absence; and, after consulting with the treasurer and the rest of that cabal, a person of quality was despatched with the copy of the articles against him. This envoy had instructions to represent to the monarch of Blefuscu the great lenity of his master, who was content to punish Gulliver no farther than the loss of his eyes; that he had fled from justice, and, if he did not return in two hours, he should be deprived of his title of nardac and declared a traitor. The envoy further added that, in order to maintain the peace and amity between both empires, his master expected that his brother of Blefuscu would give orders to have Gulliver sent back to Lilliput, bound hand and foot, to be punished as a traitor. The Emperor of Blefuscu, having taken three days to consult, returned an answer consisting of many civilities and excuses. He said that, as for sending Gulliver bound, his brother knew it was impossible. That, although Gulliver had deprived him of his fleet, yet he owed great obligations to him for many good offices he had done him in making the peace. That, however, both their majesties would soon be made easy; for Gulliver had found a prodigious vessel on the shore, able to carry him on the sea, which he had given orders to fit up with Gulliver's own assistance and direction; and he hoped in a few weeks both empires would be freed from so insupportable an incumbrance.

Final Preparations and Departure

With this answer the envoy returned to Lilliput, and the monarch of Blefuscu related to Gulliver all that had passed, offering him at the same time (but under the strictest confidence) his gracious protection if he would continue in his service; wherein, although Gulliver believed him sincere, he resolved never more to put any confidence in princes or ministers where he could possibly avoid it; and, therefore, with all due acknowledgments for his favorable intentions, he humbly begged to be excused. He told the emperor that, since fortune, whether good or evil, had thrown a vessel in his way, he was resolved to venture himself in the ocean, rather than be an occasion of difference between two such mighty monarchs. Neither did Gulliver find the emperor at all displeased; and he discovered, by a certain accident, that the emperor was very glad of his resolution, and so were most of his ministers. These considerations moved Gulliver to hasten his departure somewhat sooner than he intended; to which the court, impatient to have him gone, very readily contributed. Five hundred workmen were employed to make two sails to his boat, according to his directions, by quilting thirteen folds of their strongest linen together. He was at the pains of making ropes and cables, by twisting ten, twenty, or thirty of the thickest and strongest of theirs. A great stone, that he happened to find after a long search by the sea-shore, served him for an anchor. He had the tallow of three hundred cows for greasing his boat and other uses. He was at incredible pains in cutting down some of the largest timber-trees for oars and masts, wherein he was, however, much assisted by his majesty's ship-carpenters, who helped him in smoothing them after he had done the rough work. In about a month, when all was prepared, he sent to receive his majesty's commands and to take his leave. The emperor and royal family came out of the palace. Gulliver lay down on his face to kiss his hand, which he very graciously gave him; so did the empress and young princes of the blood. His majesty presented him with fifty purses of two hundred sprugs a-piece, together with his picture at full length, which Gulliver put immediately into one of his gloves to keep it from being hurt. He stored the boat with the carcasses of a hundred oxen and three hundred sheep, with bread and drink proportionable, and as much meat ready dressed as four hundred cooks could provide. He took with him six cows and two bulls alive, with as many ewes and lambs, intending to carry them into his own country and propagate the breed. And to feed them on board, he had a good bundle of hay and a bag of corn. He would gladly have taken a dozen of the natives, but this was a thing the emperor would by no means permit; and, besides a diligent search into his pockets, his majesty engaged Gulliver's honor not to carry away any of his subjects, although with their own consent and desire. Having thus prepared all things as well as he was able, he set sail on the twenty-fourth day of September, 1701, at six in the morning.

Consequences and Return to England

Gulliver's departure from Blefuscu directly led to his rescue by an English merchantman. After sailing about four leagues to the northward, with the wind at southeast, at six in the evening he descried a small island about half a league to the northwest. He advanced forward and cast anchor on the lee side of the island, which seemed to be uninhabited. He then took some refreshment and went to his rest. He slept well, and, as he conjectured, at least six hours, for he found the day broke two hours after he awaked. It was a clear night. He ate his breakfast before the sun was up; and heaving anchor, the wind being favorable, he steered the same course that he had done the day before, wherein he was directed by his pocket-compass. His intention was to reach, if possible, one of those islands which he had reason to believe lay to the northeast of Van Diemen's Land. He discovered nothing all that day; but upon the next, about three o'clock in the afternoon, when he had, by his computation, made twenty-four leagues from Blefuscu, he descried a sail steering to the southeast: his course was due east. He hailed her, but could get no answer; yet he found he gained upon her, for the wind slackened. He made all the sail he could, and in half-an-hour she spied him, then hung out her ancient and discharged a gun. The ship slackened her sails, and he came up with her between five and six in the evening, September twenty-sixth; but his heart leaped within him to see her English colors. The vessel was an English merchantman returning from Japan by the North and South Seas; the captain, Mr. John Biddle, of Deptford, a very civil man and an excellent sailor. Gulliver put his cows and sheep into his coat-pockets and got on board with all his little cargo of provisions. The captain thought Gulliver was raving, but Gulliver took his black cattle and sheep out of his pocket, which, after great astonishment, clearly convinced him of his veracity. Gulliver then showed him the gold given him by the Emperor of Blefuscu, together with his majesty's picture at full length and some other rarities of that country. He gave the captain two purses of two hundred sprugs each, and promised, when they arrived in England, to make him a present of a cow and a sheep. The voyage was very prosperous for the most part, and they arrived in the Downs on the thirteenth of April, 1702. Gulliver had only one misfortune: the rats on board carried away one of his sheep; he found her bones in a hole, picked clean from the flesh. He got the rest of his cattle safe ashore and set them a-grazing in a bowling-green at Greenwich, where the fineness of the grass made them feed very heartily. The short time he continued in England, he made a considerable profit by showing his cattle to many persons of quality and others; and before he began his second voyage he sold them for six hundred pounds. Since his last return, he found the breed is considerably increased, especially the sheep, which he hoped would prove much to the advantage of the woollen manufacture by the fineness of the fleeces.

Narrative Role and Significance

Gulliver's departure from Blefuscu functions as the resolution of the Lilliputian plot and the threshold to his return to the ordinary world. The event crystallizes his disillusionment with courts and ministers, a lesson he carries into his subsequent voyages. The physical details of the escape—the improvised boat, the livestock, the gold—ground the fantastic adventure in concrete, verifiable reality, reinforcing the travel-narrative convention that Gulliver both mimics and subverts. The departure also completes the symmetry of the first voyage: Gulliver arrives as a shipwrecked prisoner and leaves as a self-sufficient navigator, having used Lilliputian and Blefuscudian resources to engineer his own freedom. The episode's aftermath, in which Gulliver struggles to readjust to European scale—bending down to enter his own house, stooping lower than his wife's knees, and seeing his family as pygmies—demonstrates the profound psychological dislocation that his adventures have produced, a theme that will deepen in the later parts of his travels.