. That, this Breed of Struldbruggs
was peculiar to their Country, for there were no such People either in
Balnibarbi or Japan, where he had the Honour to be Embassador from his Majesty,
and found the Natives in both those Kingdoms very hard to believe that the Fact
was possible; and it appeared from my Astonishment when he first mentioned the
Matter to me, that I received it as a Thing wholly new, and scarcely to be
credited. That in the two Kingdoms above-mentioned, where during his Residence
he had conversed very much, he observed long Life to be the universal Desire and
Wish of Mankind. That, whoever had one Foot in the Grave, was sure to hold back
the other as strongly as he could. That the oldest had still Hopes of living one
Day longer, and looked on Death as the greatest Evil, from which Nature always
prompted him to retreat; only in this Island of Luggnagg, the Appetite for
living was not so eager, from the continual Example of the Struldbruggs before
their Eyes.
    That the System of Living contrived by me was unreasonable and unjust,
because it supposed a Perpetuity of Youth, Health, and Vigour, which no Man
could be so foolish to hope, however extravagant he might be in his Wishes.
That, the Question therefore was not whether a Man would chuse to be always in
the Prime of Youth, attended with Prosperity and Health; but how he would pass a
perpetual Life under all the usual Disadvantages which old Age brings along with
it. For although few Men will avow their Desires of being immortal upon such
hard Conditions, yet in the two Kingdoms beforementioned of Balnibarbi and
Japan, he observed that every Man desired to put off Death for sometime longer,
let it approach ever so late; and he rarely heard of any Man who died willingly,
except he were incited by the Extremity of Grief or Torture. And he appealed to
me whether in those Countries I had travelled as well as my own, I had not
observed the same general Disposition.
    After this Preface, he gave me a particular Account of the Struldbruggs
among them. He said they commonly acted like Mortals, till about Thirty Years
old, after which by Degrees they grew melancholy and dejected, increasing in
both till they came to Fourscore. This he learned from their own Confession; for
otherwise there not being above two or three of that Species born in an Age,
they were too few to form a general Observation by. When they came to Fourscore
Years, which is reckoned the Extremity of living in this Country, they had not
only all the Follies
