While this work was going on, there came from Lilliput a message demanding that Gulliver should be bound hand and foot and returned to that country as a prisoner, there to be punished as a traitor.  To this message the Emperor replied that it was not possible to bind him; that moreover the Great Man Mountain had found a vessel of size great enough to carry him over the sea, and that it was his purpose to leave the Empire of Blefuscu in the course of a few weeks.

Gulliver did not delay his work, and in less than a month he was ready to sail.

He put on board the boat the carcasses of one hundred oxen and three hundred sheep, with a quantity of bread and wine, and as much meat ready cooked as four hundred cooks could prepare.

He also took with him a herd of six live black cows and two bulls, and a flock of sheep, meaning to take them with him to England, if ever he should get there.  As food for these animals he took a quantity of hay and corn.

Gulliver would have liked to take with him some of the people, but this the Emperor would not permit.

Everything being ready, he sailed from Blefuscu on 24th September 1701, and the same night anchored on the lee side of an island which seemed to be uninhabited.  Leaving this island on the following morning, he sailed to the eastward for two days.  On the evening of the second day he sighted a ship, on reaching which, to his great joy, he found that she was an English vessel on her way home from Japan.

Putting his cattle and sheep in his coat-pockets, he went on board with all his cargo of provisions.  The captain received him very kindly, and asked him from whence he had come, and how he happened to be at sea in an open boat.

Gulliver told his tale in as few words as possible.  The captain stared with wonder, and would not believe his story.  But Gulliver then took from his pockets the black cattle and the sheep, which of course clearly showed that he had been speaking truth.  He also showed gold coins which the Emperor of Blefuscu had given him, some of which he presented to the captain.

The vessel did not arrive at the port of London till April, 1702, but there was no loss of the live stock, excepting that the rats on board carried off and ate one of the sheep.  All the others were got safely ashore, and were put to graze on a bowling-green at Greenwich, where they throve very well.

THE ARABIAN NIGHTS

ADAPTED BY AMY STEEDMAN

I

ALADDIN AND THE WONDERFUL LAMP

Far away on the other side of the world, in one of the great wealthy cities of China, there once lived a poor tailor called Mustapha.  He had a wife whom he loved dearly and an only son whose name was Aladdin.

But, sad to say, although the tailor was good and industrious, his son was so idle and bad that his father and mother did not know what to do with him.  All day long he played in the streets with other idle boys, and when he grew big enough to learn a trade he said he did not mean to work at all.  His poor father was very much troubled, and ordered Aladdin to come to the workshop to learn to be a tailor, but Aladdin only laughed, and ran away so swiftly that neither his father nor mother could catch him.