The marquis, without speaking, offered his hand to the princess to help her to descend, and, standing aside that the King might enter first, followed his majesty to the great hall, where a magnificent dinner was laid out, and where, without more delays they all sat down to feast.
Before the banquet was over, the King, charmed with the good qualities of the Marquis of Carabas, said, bowing across the table at which the princess and the miller’s son were talking very confidentially together: “It rests with you, marquis, whether you will marry my daughter.”
“I shall be only too happy,” said the marquis, and the princess’s cast-down eyes declared the same.
So they were married the very next day, and took possession of the Ogre’s castle, and of everything that had belonged to him.
As for the cat, he became at once a great lord, and had nevermore any need to run after mice, except for his own diversion.
JACK THE GIANT-KILLER
Retold by Joseph Jacobs
In the reign of the famous King Arthur there lived in Cornwall a lad named Jack, who was a boy of a bold temper and took delight in hearing or reading of conjurers, giants, and fairies; and used to listen eagerly to the deeds of the knights of King Arthur’s Round Table.
In those days there lived on St. Michael’s Mount, off Cornwall, a huge Giant, eighteen feet high and nine feet round; his fierce and savage looks were the terror of all who beheld him.
He dwelt in a gloomy cavern on the top of the mountain, and used to wade over to the mainland in search of prey, when he would throw half a dozen oxen upon his back, and tie three times as many sheep and hogs round his waist, and march back to his own abode.