“I will tell you a true story about my brother and sister and then you will know all about the great giant,” said the Sugar-bowl Fairy.
“My sister’s name was Sweetness and my brother’s was Sugar-Boy. One day they were put in a large barrel and taken away to the giant’s house. They remained in the barrel for several days, when one morning they were taken out and put in a beautiful silver sugar bowl on the giant’s table. In a few minutes the giant sat down to breakfast with his little daughter Mabel.
“They talked and laughed together, and while the little girl drank her bowl of milk the giant poured a cup of tea for himself.
“‘Now,’ whispered Sweetness to my brother, ‘if he puts us in that cup of tea we must surely be drowned.’ She trembled and snuggled up closer to my brother.
“The giant took the silver sugar-tongs and looked into the sugar bowl. It was a moment of terrible suspense. All at once he caught Sweetness and dropped her into his cup of tea. The last my brother saw of her she was dissolved in tears. And that was the end of my sister Sweetness.
“‘Won’t it be dreadful if he catches me?’ said my brother, when lo! the tongs descended into the sugar bowl again and this time caught Sugar-Boy, but he squirmed himself out and rolled down to the very bottom of the bowl and the giant took another.
“When breakfast was over and the giant and his little daughter had risen from the table, she whispered something to her father and all at once looked into the sugar bowl. Then she put her dear little hand inside and caught my brother in her rosy finger tips.
“‘There,’ said Mabel, ‘you’re the nicest looking lump of sweetness in the sugar bowl and I am going to give you to Queen Bess.’
“Sugar-Boy wondered who Queen Bess could be, but he did not have much time to think because Mabel hurried out of the room and ran after her father. They went into a stable and Sugar-Boy could hear the tramp of horses. At last they stood before a beautiful black horse. Mabel took the lump of sugar (which wasn’t a lump of sugar at all, you know, but my dear little brother) and held it up to the horse, saying, ‘See, Queen Bess, what I have brought you.’ My poor Sugar-Boy trembled with fear and thought his end was at hand, but just as the horse opened his mouth to swallow him the girl let Sugar-Boy fall and down he went into a tiny hole where it was very dark. He could hear Mabel say, ‘That is too bad, Queen Bess, but I shall get another nice lump for you.’
“‘I hope I am safe here,’ said Sugar-Boy, but no sooner did he say the words than he saw two little bright eyes peering at him. Again his heart went pit-a-pat, and in another moment a fat brown mouse came over to the dark hole. ‘This is a very lucky find,’ said the brown mouse, ‘I must take this lump of sugar to my mother.’ Sugar-Boy was frightened when the brown mouse caught him up carefully and started across the barn floor; and he was just beginning to think that this would be the last of him, when all at once a gray cat sprang out and the mouse dropped Sugar-Boy and ran for his life. There was Sugar-Boy in the middle of the floor where anybody could step on him and crush him to death.