Now Little Jap hated Big Jon-ni, and Big Jon-ni disdained Little Jap, as indeed he disdained everybody else save his conceited and colossal self. Jap curled his lip at Jon-ni; Jon-ni put out his tongue at Jap like a China figure; when the duodecimo hero bit his thumb at the elephantine Celestial, the elephantine Celestial cocked a snook at the duodecimo hero. This could not last. Little Jap was ambitious to try his sword of sharpness and his gun of swiftness upon big game. He cried, "By the heroic Hidésato who slew the giant Centipede, I will have a slap at this bouncing Bobadil of a wooden-headed, grandmother-worshipping, old Stick-in-the-mud!"
Some of his more timid friends tried to dissuade him. "Beware, Jap," they cried, "this Chinese Blunderbore is too big for thee!" "Pooh!" retorted the undaunted Jap. "Remember ——'the valiant Cornishman Who slew the giant Cormoran.' Am I not as big as Jack now, and as fit to play the Giant-killer as he? Too big? Why, the overgrown monster is like the Buddhist Daruma, who, 'arriving in China in the sixth century, at once went into a state of abstraction, which extended over nine years, during which time he never moved; and as a result lost the use of his legs.' Only Jon-ni has been 'in a state of abstraction' for nine centuries instead of nine years, and has lost the use of his head, as well as his legs! He hates and scorns my tutelary goddess, Pro-Gress. I will try the effect of her gifts upon him! Here goes!!!"
His admiring friends dubbed him "Jap the Giant-Killer" at once. And, indeed, when he "went for" that clumsy Colossus, who in physical proportions out-Chang'd Chang himself, the result of the first round, in which the swaggersome Jon-ni was fairly beaten to his knees, seemed to justify the title. But giants are not usually "knocked out" in one round, and—well, my children, tiny Jap's further fortunes in his fight with Titan Jon-ni, may furnish material for further narrative when next we gather around the glowing hibachi to tell tales of Jap the Giant-Killer!
JAP THE GIANT-KILLER.
AFTER THE BALL.