Three good giants

Pantagruel seemed not to hear Panurge, for he stood a long time looking down at the body of a giant, who, when living, must have been nearly as tall as himself. On turning away, he said : —

"I wonder where this wicked man, who loved windmills, and died from skillets, ever swallowed those fowls he talked about."

He did not leave the island until he had ordered the dead giant honorable burial in the meadow where he had died. But he did not wait for the funeral. If Widenostrils had been a good giant, he would have acted as chief mourner; but he had a fixed rule which he expressed by saying : —

"Giants should always be brotherly with Giants, but only with good Giants."

CHAPTER XXXIX. A GREAT STORM, IN WHICH PANURGE PLAYS THE COWARD.

next morning the fleet started from Tohu and Bonn, cheered by the people, who were all in the best humor, because Pantagruel had left among them a new stock of frying-pans and skillets, so shining that they could see their faces in them. The sky was bright; the wind was fair; the very sea seemed to laugh, — all the fleet was happy. But Pantagruel sat on deck, looking very sad.

Friar John was the first to notice how still Pantagruel was. On seeing his Prince so glum, the good Friar, who was always a comforting kind of man, was just about asking him the reason, when James Brayer, the pilot, after cocking one eye at the sea, and the other at the sky, and then turning both eyes up towards the flag drooping on the poop, as though it would never wave again, knew that a storm was coming on, and, therefore, bid the boatswain pipe all hands on deck, and even summon the passengers.

" In with your top-sails ! " he shouted. 'Take in your spritsail! lower your foresail ! lash your guns fast!" —all of which was done as quick as hands could do it.

Of a sudden, as though a great hand from above had swept down to stir the waters and make them mad, the sea began to swell, and moan and roar, and rise up into mountains, and sink into valleys. An awful north-west wind had got caught in with a hurricane, — so James Brayer said, — and the two together whistled through the yards, and shrieked through the shrouds. The sky itself seemed to be splitting open, and dropping down thunder, lightning, rain, and hail. In broad daylight it grew all dark, and the water rose to mountains, and sank to the depths in perfect blackness, save for the great flashes of lightning that showed the white faces of men, and the whiter foam of the sea.

It looked as though the end of the world had come, and that those on the sea had been the first to know it.

James Brayer soon had every one about him busy at the work of saving the flag-ship. Even Pantagruel was pressed into service. It

A STORM COMES ON.

was no tune for ceremony ; the danger was too great for that. James Brayer bawled through his trumpet: —

"My Lord, I must ask you to stand amidship. Your Highness is so heavy that, in a sea like this, whichever side of the ship you may be on is bound to keel over. The sea is mad, —I have never seen it so mad before ! "

Pantagruel, in the midst of all this shouting of men, and raging of the waves, and shrieking of the winds, was kneeling perfectly quiet, but praying with all his good heart to the Almighty Deliverer to save them. Hearing James Brayer call, he at once rose from his knees, and said cheerfully : —

PANTAGRUEL HOLDS THE MAST.

"Here I am, good pilot! But how am I to stand amidship without interfering with the handling of the ship ? "

"Easily enough, Your Highness. All you have to do is to put your arms around the mainmast, and stand still,"

This Pantagruel did, holding the mast firmly with both hands, and keeping it straighter than two hundred tacklings could have done. Everybody worked hard, —everybody except cowardly Panurge, who, when the sea first began to churn, sank upon deck all in a heap, more dead than alive. He could do nothing but whine and cry boo! boo! boo! boo! and call upon Heaven to save him. In the meanwhile, all the others were as busy as beavers, — Friar John, Gymnaste, Carpalim, Xenomanes, even Epistemon and old Ponocrates himself! All did wonders ; but nobody worked like Friar John during all the storm ; so, at least, declared James Brayer. Why, Friar John even pulled off his monk's gown, a thing he had, until then, been known to do only

A SEA BREAKS OVEB PANTJROE.

once, and that was when he saved the Abbey-Vineyard. " It bothers me, and I can't work in it," he said, as he pulled it off. With his waistcoat for a coat, he stood at his post with strong arm and cheery word for everybody. Every now and then he would glance at Panurge, still squatted on deck and crying, " Boo ! boo ! boo ! boo ! Friar John, my friend, good father, I am drowning. Boo! boo! boo! The water has got into my shoes. Boo! boo! boo! boboo! I drown! Oh, how I wish I was a gardener, and planted cabbages, for then I would be sure of always having at least one foot on land ! Oh, my