A wise woman, or witch of Treen, who could take any shape, was selected as the most likely person to execute their project without causing any stir with Maen giant, who was very fierce, and proud of his descent from old blustering Bellerus, who was said to have lived thereabouts in days of yore.
One afternoon away went the witch, and, without being noticed on the road, reached Cairn-men-ellas, where she hid herself between rocks to watch. A little before sunset she saw a giant's child, of four years or so, coming that way with some common people's children, who wanted to show him how to play bob. Now the infant giant, though as big as an ordinary man, was still a baby in every feature, and he hadn't been long weaned; he still wore a bib, though he had out-grown his clothes, and his frock and saveall (pinafore) scarcely reached to his knees. The common boys and girls, from ten to a dozen years of age—like children in size to him—led about the great slab, as they termed him, and did with him just as they pleased.
The woman, seeing them place buttons (and they hadn't many) on the bob, took from her basket a string of large bright ones, shook them before the giant baby, and said, "Now kiss me, dear, and I will give 'e all these." He kissed her again and again, delighted to have the buttons. Over awhile she said, "The tides are low and I am on my way to get lempots (limpets) and gweans (winkles) from Cowloe; will 'e go, dears?"
The elder ones said it was then too late—they must be all home to Treve before sundown, or their mammies would strap them soundly and send them to bed without supper. But the babe-giant said, "I'll go, for I want some gweans to play five-stones, and lempots too, that my da may shoe the cats with croggans (limpet-shells) and codgey-wax (cobblers'-wax). He do dearly like that fun, and my ma do never beat me."
"Come along then, my turtle," said the witch, as she took his hand and led him off.
On the way she took from her basket many toys and showed him how to play with them. This pleased him, so that he thought no more of Cowloe, and she led him away over the Green to Brew Moors, where, to divert him she changed herself into the shape of a horse, and he trotted on her a mile or more, when she resumed her woman's form, and led him into Castle Treen, where he was received with open arms by the mistress.
It would take long to tell how he was caressed by the childless pair and fed by their people.
He often reposed, during his infancy, in a small chair that may still be seen near the large one in which the giant usually rested—the one just opposite the Logan Rock; and, until he grew too big, he frequently slept in the giant's arms.
At sunrise in summer the old giant delighted to carry him up to Castle Peak, where he placed the infant to stand on the topmost stone, which was much higher then than now, and named to him all the noted places within ken. After turning him round that he might behold the magnificent prospect on either hand of wild, sea-lashed headlands in the distance, and noble carns towering near, he would exclaim, "My dear boy, who wouldn't be proud of such a home as this? Believe me, dear son, in all this western land—from the Lizard Point, that you see yonder, to Pedn-Penwith, which lies under the setting sun—there is not another giant who owns a place equal to Castle Treen; and all shall be thine, my darling, when I am dead and gone."
When the sun shone warm he took baby down to the Castle Leas, near the Gap. This was his favourite fishing place, where a deep pit may still be seen in which he pounded browse, that was cast on the water to entice in fish. From these rocks, at the water's edge, the giant, like a monstrous dolphin, stretched on the sea with the boy standing on his broad back, and holding on by the hair of his head like bridle-reins with both hands, would swim out and round to the Sees—the rock that stands like an island in Gampar, (Close or Little Cove), just under Hal-dynas, and at the eastern end of the outer mound of his fortress. Having rested there awhile and given the cheeld a few shags' eggs, limpets, mussels, and such like dainties, back they would steer, but farther out; and, coasting all the seaboard of his Castle, land in Par Pry.