LITTLE · THUMB
should dress them; but thinking that he had ordered her to go and put on their cloaths, went up, and was strangely astonished when she perceived her seven daughters killed, and weltering in their blood. She fainted away; for this is the first expedient almost all women find in such-like cases. The Ogre, fearing his wife would be too long in doing what he had ordered, went up himself to help her. He was no less amazed than his wife, at this frightful spectacle.
"Ah! what have I done?" cried he. "The cursed wretches shall pay for it, and that instantly."
He threw then a pitcher of water upon his wife's face; and having brought her to herself:
"Give me quickly," cried he, "my boots of seven leagues, that I may go and catch them."
He went out; and, having run over a vast deal of ground, both on this side and that, he came at last into the very road where the poor children were, and not above a hundred paces from their father's house. They espied the Ogre, who went at one step from mountain to mountain, and over rivers as easily as the narrowest kennels.[1] Little Thumb, seeing a hollow rock near the place where they were, made his brothers hide themselves in it, and crowded into it himself, minding always what would become of the Ogre.
The Ogre, who found himself much tired with his long and fruitless journey (for these boots of seven leagues extremely fatigue the wearer), had a great mind to rest him-
- ↑ That is, 'channels.'
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