ger, and gave her a box on the ear.
Tricksey-Wee cried; and Buffy-Bob was so sorry and so ashamed of
himself that he cried too, and ran off into the wood. He was so long
gone that Tricksey-Wee began to be frightened, for she was very fond of
her brother; and she was so distressed that she had first teased him
and then cried, that at last she ran into the wood to look for him,
though there was more chance of losing herself than of finding him.
And, indeed, so it seemed likely to turn out; for, running on without
looking, she at length found herself in a valley she knew nothing
about. And no wonder; for what she thought was a valley with round,
rocky sides, was no other than the space between two of the roots of a
great tree that grew on the borders of Giantland. She climbed over the
side of it, and went towards what she took for a black, round-topped
mountain, far away; but which she soon discovered to be close to her,
and to be a hollow place so great that she could not tell what it was
hollowed out of. Staring at it, she found that it was a doorway; and
going nearer and staring harder, she saw the door, far in, with a
knocker of iron upon it, a great many yards above her head, and as
large as the anchor of a big ship. Now, nobody had ever been unkind to
Tricksey-Wee, and therefore she was not afraid of anybody. For
Buffy-Bob's box on the ear she did not think worth considering. So
spying a little hole at the bottom of the door which had been nibbled
by some giant mouse, she crept through it, and found herself in an
enormous hall. She could not have seen the other end of it at all,
except for the great fire that was burning there, diminished to a spark
in the distance. Towards this fire she ran as fast as she could, and
was not far from it when something fell before her with a great
clatter, over which she tumbled, and went rolling on the floor. She was
not much hurt however, and got up in a moment. Then she saw that what
she had fallen over was not unlike a great iron bucket. When she
examined it more closely, she discovered that it was a thimble; and
looking up to see who had dropped it, beheld a huge face, with
spectacles as big as the round windows in a church, bending over her,
and looking everywhere for the thimble. Tricksey-Wee immediately laid
hold of it in both her arms, and lifted it about an inch nearer to the
nose of the peering giantess. This movement made the old lady see where
it was, and, her finger poppi