Chapter 5.
A Grand Debate at the General Assembly and How It Was Determined.
Every fourth year there is a council called by the whole Hoiknam Nation, which continues on for five or six days.
Representatives from all over attend and discuss the state of the several districts, such as whether they have too much or not enough Hay oats, cows or yahoos.
If there is any district wanting, it is immediately satisfied by common agreement of the council.
One of these councils was held about three months before my departure.
My master attended as the representative of our district.
In this council, an old debate was brought up again.
My master, after his return, gave me a very detailed account of it.
The question to be debated was whether or not the yahoos should be removed from the island.
There were many arguments in favor of this.
The yahoos were the most filthy and deformed animal that nature had ever produced.
They were also the most misbehaved.
They trampled the fields and, if they were not watched carefully, would surely commit a thousand other horrors.
My master spoke up then.
He said that he believed the first Yahu's had been driven here by the sea.
Upon coming to land, they had retired to the mountains.
Over time, they had become much more savage than those of their own species in the country from which they had come.
He said that he had now in his possession a wonderful Yahu, meaning myself, which most of them had heard of and many of them had seen.
He explained how he first found me, how my body was covered with the skins and hairs of other animals, and how I spoke a language of my own and had thoroughly learned their language.
He added that I had tried to convince him that Yahu's and other countries acted as the ruling animals and held the Hohenheims as servants.
He also explained our manner of disciplining brute animals.
He said it was no shame to learn wisdom from brutes.
Perhaps our forms of discipline might be practiced among the younger yahoos to make them both more tame and more agreeable.
My master related all of this to me, though he concealed one specific fact which related personally to myself and of which I soon felt the unhappy effect.
In the meantime, I had settled in quite nicely.
My master had ordered a room to be made for me about six yards from the house.
When my clothes were worn to rags, I made myself new ones with skins of rabbits.
I resold my shoes with wood that I cut from a tree and fitted into the existing leather.
I often got honey out of hollow trees, which I mixed with my bread.
All in all, I enjoyed perfect health and peace of mind.
When I thought of my friends and family, or the human race in general, I looked on them as yahoos, in shape and manner, though perhaps a bit more polite and with the gift of speech.
I looked upon my hosts with such delight that I fell into imitating them.
Since my return home, my friends have told me that I trot like a horse, which I take as the highest compliment.
In the middle of this happiness, my master sent for me one morning a little earlier than usual.
I saw by his expression that he was confused and unsure about how to begin speaking.
After a short silence, he told me he did not know how I would take what he was going to say.
In the last general assembly, when the affair of the yahoos had been taken up, the representatives had taken some offense at his keeping a yahoo in his family.
More like a hoi hin him than a brute animal.
The assembly recommended that he either employ me like the rest of my species or command me to swim back to the place from which I came.
The first of these options was rejected by all of the hoikinims who had seen me.
As I had some basics of reason, it was to be feared that I might be able to force the other yahoos into rebellion.
My master doubted if I could swim to another country and wished I would come up with some kind of vehicle resembling those I had described to him.
He said that for his own part, he would have been happy to keep me in service for as long as I lived.
He felt that I had done my best to cure myself of my bad habits.
I was struck with great grief and despair at my master's words and fell into a faint by his feet.
When I awoke, he told me he had thought me dead.
I answered that death would have been too great a happiness and that, while I understood the council's decision, it might have been less strict.
I told him however, that although I thought it impossible, I would try to build such a vessel, as he mentioned.
Furthermore, the idea of death was the least of my worries.
Supposing I should escape with my life.
I could not imagine passing my days among yahoos without returning to all of my old ways.
My master made me a very gracious reply and allowed me the space of two months to finish my boat.
In about six weeks' time, I fashioned a rough sort of Indian canoe.
I covered the canoe with the animal skins and stitched together my sails with the same material.
I provided myself with four paddles, stocked my boat with meat and took two jugs, one filled with milk and the other with water.
When the day had come for my departure, I took leave of my master and his family, and My eyes were flowing with tears and my heart sunk with grief.
His honor was kind enough to see me off in my canoe, and before I left, I kneeled before him.
He raised his hoof gently to my mouth, allowing me to kiss it.
I paid my respects to the rest of the Hohenems present then, getting into my canoe, I pushed off from shore.
