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'Dear friend', said Shortshanks. 'do pray let me go. I long so to run down and play a while with the other children. Well! the kitchen-maid gave him leave to go, but he must promise to be back by the time the roast was turned, and he was to mind and bring a big bundle of wood with him.
One day Shortshanks and the king were out walking, and Shortshanks asked the king if he hadn't any more children? 'Yes', said the king, 'I had another daughter; but the Ogre has taken her away, because there was no one who could save her.
So Shortshanks came in, and the Ogre asked him if it were true that he could brew a hundred lasts of malt at a strike? 'Yes it is', said Shortshanks. 'Twas good luck then to lay hands on you', said the Ogre, 'and now fall to work this minute; but heaven help you if you don't brew the ale strong enough.
Now you are going to have one daughter, but if you can set the other free whom the Ogre has carried off, you shall have her too with all my heart, and the other half of my kingdom. 'Well', said Shortshanks, 'I may as well try; but I must have an iron cable, five hundred fathoms long, and five hundred men, and food for them to last fifteen weeks, for I have a long voyage before me.
After that, Shortshanks wandered on a while, and another old, old crook- backed hag met him who had only one eye, which Shortshanks stole before she was aware of him. 'Oh, oh! whatever has become of my eye', screamed the hag. 'What will you give me to get your eye back? asked Shortshanks.
As for Shortshanks, he went first of all on board the Ogre's ship, and took a whole heap of gold and silver rings, as large as hoops, and trotted off with them as hard as he could to the palace.
'Now', said Shortshanks, 'you know, we are so much alike, that no one can tell the one from the other; so just change clothes with me and go into the palace; then the princesses will think it is I that am coming in, and the one that kisses you first you shall have for your wife, and I will have the other for mine.
Then Shortshanks took hold of the cable by one end, and laid a link or two into the ship; and as he threw in the links, the ship grew bigger and bigger, till at last it got so big, that there was room enough and to spare in it for the cable, and the five hundred men, and their food, and Shortshanks, and all.
In tales such as 'The Old Dame and her Hen', No. iii, 'The Giant who had no Heart in his Body', No. ix, 'Shortshanks', No. xx, 'Boots and the Troll', No. xxxii, 'Boots who ate a match with the Troll', No. v, the easy temper of the old Frost Giants predominates, and we almost pity them as we read.
The Giants or Trolls can neither brew nor wash properly, as we see in Shortshanks, No. xx, where the Ogre has to get Shortshanks to brew his ale for him; and in 'East o' the Sun and West o' the Moon', No. iv, where none of the Trolls are able to wash out the spot of tallow.
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