Chapter I: Front Matter

JACK THE GIANT KILLER.

By Percival Leigh

The Author Of "The Comic Latin Grammar."

With Illustrations by JOHN LEECH

1853

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THE ARGUMENT.

I sing the deeds of famous Jack,
The doughty Giant Killer hight;
How he did various monsters "whack,"
And so became a gallant knight.

In Arthur's days of splendid fun
(His Queen was Guenever the Pliant),--
Ere Britain's sorrows had begun;
When every cave contained its giant;

When griffins fierce as bats were rife;
And till a knight had slain his dragon,
At trifling risk of limbs and life,
He did n't think he'd much to brag on;

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When wizards o'er the welkin flew;
Ere science had devised balloon;
And 'twas a common thing to view
A fairy ballet by the moon;--

Our hero played his valiant pranks;
Earned loads of _kudos, vulgô_ glory,
A lady, "tin," and lots of thanks;--
Relate, oh Muse! his wondrous story.

OF GIANTS IN GENERAL.

A Giant was, I should premise,
A hulking lout of monstrous size;
He mostly stood--I know you 'll laugh--
About as high as a giraffe.

His waist was some three yards in girth:
When he walked he shook the earth.
His eyes were of the class called "goggle,"
Fitter for the scowl than ogle.

His mouth, decidedly carnivorous,
Like a shark's,--the Saints deliver us!
He yawned like a huge sarcophagus,
For he was an Anthropophagus,

And his tusks were huge and craggy;
His hair, and his brows, and his beard, were shaggy.

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I ween on the whole he was aught but a Cupid,
And exceedingly fierce, and remarkably stupid;

His brain partaking strongly of lead,
How well soe'er he was off for head;
Having frequently one or two
Crania more than I or you.

He was bare of arm and leg,
But buskins had, and a philabeg;
Also a body-coat of mail
That shone with steel or brazen scale,
Like to the back of a crocodile's tail;

A crown he wore,
And a mace he bore
That was knobbed and spiked with adamant;
It would smash the skull
Of the mountain bull,
Or scatter the brains of the elephant.

His voice than the tempest was louder and gruffer--
Well; so much for the uncouth "buffer."

JACK'S BIRTH, PARENTAGE, EDUCATION, AND EARLY PURSUITS.

Of a right noble race was Jack,
For kith and kin he did not lack,
Whom tuneful bards have puffed;
The Seven bold Champions ranked among
That highly celebrated throng,
And Riquet with the Tuft.

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Jack of the Beanstalk, too, was one;
And Beauty's Beast; and Valour's son,
Sir Amadis de Gaul:
But if I had a thousand tongues,
A throat of brass, and iron lungs,
I could not sing them all.

His sire was a farmer hearty and free;
He dwelt where the Land's End frowns on the sea,
And the sea at the Land's End roars again,
Tit for tat, land and main.

He was a worthy wight, and so
He brought up his son in the way he should go;
He sought not--not he!--to make him a "muff;"
He never taught him a parcel of stuff;

He bothered him not with trees and plants,
Nor told him to study the manners of ants.
He himself had never been
Bored with the Saturday Magazine;
The world might be flat, or round, or square,
He knew not, and he did not care;
Nor wished that a boy of his should be
A Cornish "Infant Prodigy."

But he stored his mind with learning stable,
The deeds of the Knights of the famed Round Table;
Legends and stories, chants and lays,
Of witches and warlocks, goblins and fays;
How champions of might
Defended the right,

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Freed the captive, and succoured the damsel distrest
Till Jack would exclaim--
"If I don't do the same,
An' I live to become a man,--_I'm blest!_"

Jack lightly recked of sport or play
Wherein young gentlemen delight,
But he would wrestle any day,
Box, or at backsword fight.

He was a lad of special "pluck,"
And strength beyond his years,
Or science, gave him aye the luck
To drub his young compeers.

His task assigned, like Giles or Hodge,
The woolly flocks to tend,
His wits to warlike fray or "dodge"
Wool-gathering oft would wend.

And then he'd wink his sparkling eye,
And nod his head right knowingly,
And sometimes "Won't I just!" would cry,
Or "At him, Bill, again!"

Now this behaviour did evince
A longing for a foe to mince;
An instinct fitter for a Prince
Than for a shepherd swain.

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HOW JACK SLEW THE GIANT CORMORAN.---