"Very well; try!" shouted Jack, who was not a bit afraid, for he saw the giant was so tipsy he could hardly stand, much less run; and he himself had young legs and a clear conscience, which carry a man a long way. So, after leading the giant a considerable race, he contrived to be first at the top of the bean-stalk, and then scrambled down it as fast as he could, the harp playing all the while the most melancholy music, till he said, "Stop"; and it stopped. Arrived at the bottom, he found his mother sitting at her cottage door, weeping silently. "Here, mother, don't cry; just give me a hatchet; make haste." For he knew there was not a moment to spare. He saw the giant beginning to descend the bean-stalk. However, it was too late--the monster's ill deeds had come to an end. Jack with his hatchet cut the bean-stalk close off at the root; the giant fell headlong into the garden, and was killed on the spot. Instantly the fairy appeared and explained everything to Jack's mother, begging her to forgive Jack, who was his father's own son for bravery and generosity, and who would be sure to make her happy for the rest of her days. So all ended well, and nothing was ever more heard or seen of the wonderful bean-stalk. 158 Those wonder stories that concern themselves with giants or with very little people have always been favorites with children. Of the little heroes Tom Thumb has always held the center of the stage. His adventures in one form or another are in the folk tales of most European countries. He has the honor of being the subject of a monograph by the great French scholar Gaston Paris. Hans Christian Andersen turned him into a delightful little girl in his derivative story of "Thumbelina." The English version of "Tom Thumb" seems to have been printed first in ballad form in the seventeenth century, and later in many chapbook versions in prose. Its plot takes the form of a succession of marvelous accidents by land and sea, limited only by the inventive ingenuity of the story-teller. "According to popular tradition Tom Thumb died at Lincoln. . . . There was a little blue flagstone in the pavement of the Minster which was shown as Tom Thumb's monument, and the country folks never failed to marvel at it when they came to church on the Assize Sunday; but during some of the modern repairs which have been inflicted on that venerable building, the flagstone was displaced and lost, to the great discomfiture of the holiday visitants." Thus wrote an ancient and learned scholar in illustration of the tendency to give a local habitation and a name to our favorite fancies. The version of the story given by Miss Mulock in her _Fairy Book_ is the one used here.