Page:Tudor Jenks--Imaginotions.djvu/148

130 "If you can convince me that I ought to be eaten," I said, willing to be reasonable, "I shall certainly offer no objection. But I confess I have little fear that you will succeed."

"I first discovered that I was a giant," he said, absently chewing the stem of the India-rubber tree, "at a very early age. I could not get enough to eat. I then lived in New York City, for I am an American, like yourself."

We bowed with mutual pleasure.

"I tried various sorts of work, but found I could not earn enough at any of them to pay my board-bills. I even exhibited myself in a museum, but found there the same trouble.

"I consulted my grandfather, who vas a man of matured judgment and excellent sense. His advice vas to leave the city and try for work in the country. I did so, and after some little trouble found employment upon a farm. I stayed there three days. Then I was told that it cost more to keep me than I was worth; which was true. So I left. Then I went to work on a railroad. There I did as much as twenty men. The result was a strike, and I was discharged."

"Is there much more autobiography?" I asked as politely as I could, for I vas not at all interested in this unscientific memoir.

"Very little," he answered. "I can sum it up in a few words. Wherever I tried to get work, I was discharged, because my board was too expensive. If I tried to do more work to make up for it, the other men were dissatisfied, because it took the bread out of their mouths. Now, I put it to you, what was I to do?" "Evidently, you were forced out of civilization," I answered, "and compelled to rely upon nature for your sustenance. That is," I went on, to forestall another question, "you had to become a hunter, trapper, or fisherman,—for of course, in your case, agriculture was out of the question, as you could n't easily get down to the ground, and would crush with your feet more crops than you could raise with your hands."