handkerchief. "Why, you are all wet and muddy!" he cried, wiping
his hands. "Where did you see him?"

"The giant, sir?" said the poor fellow, shivering.

"Giant?" cried Ramball. "Well, yes, giant if you like. Where did you
see him?"

"It was about a mile down the road, sir, and we was coming down the Cut
Lane with a load of clover, my mate and me, which we had been to fetch
for the governor's horses in the yard here. My mate was driving, and I
was sitting on a heap of the clover, stacked up on the hind ladder of
the cart. We'd stopped a while after loading up, being a bit tired, to
give the horses a drink, and it had got dark, while as we was coming
home, me sitting behind as I telled you, and my mate driving in front,
all of a suddent, and just as I was half-asleep and smoking my pipe, a
great big giant loomed up on t'other side of the hedge, and before I
knew where I was he reaches down, slips his arm round me, and lifts me
right out of the cart."

The man wiped his face with his muddy hand and uttered a low groan.

"Well, go on," cried Ramball. "What next?"

"Don't hurry me, master, please," said the man piteously. "I'm shook
all to pieces, and feel that freckened that I could sit down and cry. I
was too much staggered to call out for help, and when I tried to look
round, my mate and the cart was gone, and this 'ere great thing was
carrying me away right across Snow's field, and all I could think of was
that he was hungry and had made me his prey."

"Humph! An ogre, I suppose," said the Colonel to the boys.

"No, sir," said the man; "it was one of them there great giants as you
read of in books; and no matter how I tried to get away, he only hugged
me the tighter."

"Well, well," said the Colonel; "but you did escape."

"No, sir; I didn't, sir. He carried me right across the field and
dropped me into the big horse-pond in the corner. I was half-drowned, I
was; and when I struggled to the side my legs stuck in the mud right up
to my knees. And then I found that I had come out, half-blind with mud
and water, just where he was standing with his back to me, and then I
daren't move. But he took no more notice of me, and walked right off,
so that I saved my life. Next thing was I come upon your two men, Mr
Ramball, sir, and they got asking me questions; but I was too skeart to
understand what they meant, and so they brought me here.--You don't
know, I suppose," he continued, speaking to one of th