Then he took one of the pups, and one of the two horses that was foaled after the mare eating the fish, and the wind that was after him could not catch him, and he caught the wind that was before him. And he went on till he came to a cooper’s house, and he asked did he want a servant. ‘Well,’ says the cooper, ‘I have thirteen goats—twelve goats and a puck—and let you bring them out and be minding them to-morrow.’ ‘I will do that for you,’ says Shawneen. So the cooper engaged him, and on the morrow he brought out the goats to the place he was bade, that was the top of a mountain. And there was a gentleman’s demesne, and walls about it, and he looked in at the gate and he saw grass growing up as high as the trees. ‘Why wouldn’t my poor goats go in there,’ says he, ‘and be grazing in it, and not to be out on that red mountain where there is not a rib of grass, and what they are eating is clay?’ So he drove in the goats through the gate, and they were eating the grass, and he heard some person coming, and he went up in a tree. He saw a giant coming into the field. The giant looked at him. ‘I see where you are in the tree,’ says he. ‘And I think you too big for one mouthful,’ says he; ‘and I think you too small for two mouthfuls, and I don’t know what will I do with you unless I will grind you up and make snuff for my nose.’ ‘As you are strong be merciful,’ says Shawneen up in the tree. ‘Come down out of that, you little dwarf,’ says the giant, ‘or I’ll tear you and the tree asunder.’ So Shawneen came down. ‘Would you sooner be driving red-hot knives into one another’s hearts,’ says the giant, ‘or would you sooner be fighting one another on red-hot flags?’ ‘Fighting on red-hot flags is what I’m used to at home,’ says Shawneen; ‘and your dirty feet will be sinking in them and my feet will be rising.’ So then they began the fight. The ground that was hard they made soft, and the ground that was soft they made hard, and they made spring-wells come up through the green flags. They were like that all through the day, no one getting the upper hand of the other; and at last a little bird came and sat on the bush and said to Shawneen: ‘If you won’t make an end of him by sunset, he’ll make an end of you.’ Then Shawneen put out his strength, and he brought the giant down on his knees. ‘Give me my life,’ says the giant, ‘and I’ll give you the best gift I have.’ ‘What gift is that?’ says Shawneen. ‘A Sword that nothing can stand against,’ says the giant. ‘Where is it to be found?’ says Shawneen. ‘In that red door you see there in the hill.’ So Shawneen went and got it out. ‘Where will I try the Sword?’ says he. ‘Try it on that ugly black stump of a tree,’ says the giant. ‘I see nothing blacker or uglier than your own head,’ says Shawneen. And with that he made one stroke, and cut off the giant’s head that it went into the air, and he caught it on the Sword as it was coming down, and made two halves of it. ‘It is well for you I did not