For a long while now we crawl upon this diamond-pointed star-floor in silence save for the suck and lisp of the pole in the mud".
She suffered from severe headaches and was reproved by other women for her lengthy walks across rugged terrain (on one dark evening she "was often obliged to crawl upon all fours").
One phrase from ealier in the novel resonates: "I cannot but conclude that the Bulk of your Natives, to be the most pernicious Race of little odious Vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the Surface of the Earth".
How hints, like spawn, scarce quick in embryo lie; How new-born nonsense first is taught to cry, Maggots, half-form'd, in rhyme exactly meet, And learn to crawl upon poetic feet.
He also gets to discuss the condition of Europe with the King, who concludes with Swiftian venom that "the bulk of your natives [are] the most pernicious race of odious little vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth".
It's a fundamental fact of calculus and non-Euclidean geometry, small sections of large curved surfaces will always look flat to little creatures that crawl upon it.
