Page:Astonishing and delightful history of Jack and the giants.pdf/6

6 men’s cattle which often became his prey for whensoever he had occasion for food, he would wade over the main land, where he would furnish himself with whatever he could find. For the people at his approach would forsake their habitations; then did he seize on their cows and oxen, of which he would make nothing to carry over on his back half a dozen at a time; and as for their sheep and hogs, he would tie them round his waste like a bunch of bandeliers. This he for many years had practised in Cornwall, which was much impoverished by him.

But one day Jack coming to the town-hall, when the magistrates were sitting in consultation about the Giant, he asked them, what reward they would give to any person that would destroy him? They answered, he should have all the Giant’s treasure in recompence, Quoth Jack then I myself will undertake the work.