giants, when they have not got ogresses as wives, are never objects of complete aversion. On the contrary, the young reader rejoices over the downfall of the bulky one, not on the score of his vices, or because he deserves his fate, but because the child’s sympathies naturally incline towards the undersized personages of the story; and if the poor blundering old giant could be only brought up smiling over a hasty pudding on the last page, the story would not be thought, in the nursery, to be any the worse for that — so long, of course, as there was no doubt left in anybody’s mind as to Jack being able to kill Blunderbore again, should Blunderbore’s conduct again justify his destruction. Sometimes, I regret to remember, the giants went about collecting children for pies, and from such as these all right- minded men should withhold their esteem; but for the rest, the ordinary muscular and inoffensive giant, it is impossible to deny a certain liking, nor, when he is provoked to display his strength, a great admiration.
