Chapter I: Front Matter

The Book of Friendly Giants

THE BOOK OF
FRIENDLY GIANTS
BY EUNICE FULLER
WITH INTRODUCTORY VERSES
BY SEYMOUR BARNARD
AND DRAWINGS BY
PAMELA COLMAN SMITH

“_Giants should always be
brotherly with giants, but only
with good giants._”

_Maxim of Pantagruel._

NEW YORK
THE CENTURY COMPANY

Copyright, 1914, by
THE CENTURY CO.

_Published, October, 1914_

PRINTED IN U. S. A.

In Defense of Giants

Somehow or other, the giants seem to have got a bad name. No sooner is the word “giant” mentioned than some one is sure to shrug his shoulders and speak in a meaning tone of “Jack and the Beanstalk.” Now, this is not only unkind, but, on the giants’ part, quite undeserved. For, as everybody who is intimate with them knows, there are very few of the Beanstalk variety.

No self-respecting giant would any more think of threatening a little boy, or of grinding up people’s bones to make flour, than would a good fairy godmother. Giants’ dispositions are in proportion to the size of their bodies, and so when they are good, as most of them are, they are the kindest-hearted folk in the world, and like nothing better than helping human beings out of scrapes.

The trouble is that many of the stories were written by people who do not really know the giants at all, but are so afraid of them as to suppose that giants must be cruel just because they are big. Every one else has taken it for granted that the giants were big enough to take care of themselves, and so nobody has bothered to look into the facts of the case. Mr. Andrew Lang has given us a whole rainbow of books about the fairies, but no one seems ever to have written down the whole history of the giants.

This is a pity, particularly since a great many people have had a chance to know the giants intimately. For in the old days the giants used to live all over the world—in Germany, and Ireland, and Norway, and even here in our own country. And since they have moved back into a land of their own, they have sometimes come into other countries on a visit and a brave Englishman, as you will see, once went to visit them.

The history of the giants is as simple as their good-natured lives. All the giants came originally from one big giant family. And wherever they went, they kept the same giant ways, and enjoyed playing the same big, clumsy jokes on each other.

Contents

PAGE

I THE GIANT AND THE HERDBOY 3

II THE GIANTS’ SHIP
PART ONE:—HOW THE GIANTS WENT EXPLORING 31
PART TWO:—HOW THE GIANTS’ SHIP WAS STOLEN 43

III HOW THE GIANTS GOT THE BEST OF THOR 63

IV THE CUNNING OF FIN’S WIFE 87

V HOW JACK FOUND THE GIANT RIVERRATH 109

VI THE GIANTS’ POT 147

VII THE GIANT WHO RODE ON THE ARK 171

VIII THE WIGWAM GIANTS 191

IX THE GIANT WHO BECAME A SAINT 215

X GARGANTUA