chen-table in
the country, and, standing erect, hold it dangling in his jaws. There's
many a big oak table and dresser in certain districts of England, which
bear the marks of Giles's teeth; and I make no doubt that, a hundred or
two years hence, there'll be strange stories about those marks, and that
people will point them out as a proof that there were giants in bygone
time, and that many a dentist will moralize on the decays which human
teeth have undergone.

"They wanted me to go about with them, and exhibit my gift occasionally,
as they did theirs, promising that the money that was got by the
exhibitions should be honestly divided. I consented, and we set off
together, and that evening coming to a village, and putting up at the ale-
house, all the grand folks of the village being there smoking their
pipes, we contrived to introduce the subject of hopping--the upshot being
that Ned hopped against the school-master for a pound, and beat him
hollow; shortly after, Giles, for a wager, took up the kitchen table in
his jaws, though he had to pay a shilling to the landlady for the marks
he left, whose grandchildren will perhaps get money by exhibiting them.
As for myself, I did nothing that day, but the next, on which my
companions did nothing, I showed off at hulling stones against a cripple,
the crack man for stone-throwing, of a small town, a few miles farther
on. Bets were made to the tune of some pounds; I contrived to beat the
cripple, and just contrived; for to do him justice I must acknowledge he
was a first-rate hand at stones, though he had a game hip, and went
sideways; his head, when he walked--if his movements could be called
walking--not being above three feet above the ground. So we travelled, I
and my companions, showing off our gifts, Giles and I occasionally for a
gathering, but Ned never hopping, unless against somebody for a wager. We
lived honestly and comfortably, making no little money by our natural
endowments, and were known over a great part of England as 'Hopping Ned,'
'Biting Giles,' and 'Hull over the Head Jack,' which was my name, it
being the blackguard fashion of the English, do you see, to--"

Here I interrupted the jockey. "You may call it a blackguard fashion,"
said I, "and I dare say it is, or it would scarcely be English; but it is
an immensely ancient one, and is handed down to us from our northern
ancestry, especially the Danes, who were in the habit of giving people
surnames,