There is but one sex either of the cooking or any other animals in the
moon; they are all produced from trees of various sizes and foliage;
that which produces the cooking animal, or human species, is much more
beautiful than any of the others; it has large straight boughs and
flesh-coloured leaves, and the fruit it produces are nuts or pods, with
hard shells at least two yards long; when they become ripe, which is
known from their changing colour, they are gathered with great care, and
laid by as long as they think proper: when they choose to animate the
seed of these nuts, they throw them into a large cauldron of boiling
water, which opens the shells in a few hours, and out jumps the
creature.
Nature forms their minds for different pursuits before they come
into the world; from one shell comes forth a warrior, from another a
philosopher, from a third a divine, from a fourth a lawyer, from a fifth
a farmer, from a sixth a clown, &c. &c., and each of them immediately
begins to perfect themselves, by practising what they before knew only
in theory.
When they grow old they do not die, but turn into air, and dissolve like
smoke! As for their drink, they need none; the only evacuations they
have are insensible, and by their breath. They have but one finger upon
each hand, with which they perform everything in as perfect a manner
as we do who have four besides the thumb. Their heads are placed under
their right arm, and when are going to travel, or about any violent
exercise, they generally leave them at home, for they can consult them
at any distance; this is a very common practice; and when those of rank
or quality among the Lunarians have an inclination to see what's going
forward among the common people, they stay at home, _i.e._, the body
stays at home, and sends the head only, which is suffered to be present
_incog._, and return at pleasure with an account of what has passed.
The stones of their grapes are exactly like hail; and I am perfectly
satisfied that when a storm or high wind in the moon shakes their vines,
and breaks the grapes from the stalks, the stones fall down and form
our hail showers. I would advise those who are of my opinion to save a
quantity of these stones when it hails next, and make Lunarian wine. It
is a common beverage at St. Luke's. Some material circumstances I had
nearly omitted. They put their bellies to the same use as we do a sack,
and throw whatever they have occasion for into it, for they can shut and
open it again when they please, as they do their stomachs; they are not
troubled with bowels, liver, heart, or any other intestines, neither
are they encumbered with clothes, nor is there any part of their bodies
unseemly or indecent to exhibit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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