A Book of Giants: Tales of Very Tall Men of Myth, Legend, History, and Science.

There was a merchant in Chong-ju who used to go to Quelpart to buy seaweed. One time when he drew upon the shore he saw a man shuffling along on the ground towards the boat. He crept nearer, and at last took hold of the side with both his hands and pulled himself in.

"When I looked at him," said the merchant, "I found he was an old man without any legs. Astonished, I asked, saying, 'How is it, old man, that you have lost your legs?'

"He said in reply, 'I lost my legs on a trip once when I was shipwrecked, and a great fish bit them off.'"

"However did that happen?" inquired the merchant.

And the old man said:

"We were caught in a gale and driven till we touched on some island or other. Before us on the shore stood a high castle with a great gateway. The twenty or so of us who were together in the storm-tossed boat were all exhausted from cold and hunger, and lying exposed. We landed and managed to go together to the castle.

"There was in it one man only, whose height was terrible to behold, and whose chest was many spans round. His face was black and his eyes large and rolling. His voice was like the braying of a monster donkey.

"Our people made motions showing that they wanted something to eat. The man made no reply, but securely fastened the front gate. After this he brought an armful of wood, put it in the middle of the courtyard, and there made a fire. When the fire blazed up he rushed after us and caught a young lad, one of our company, cooked him before our eyes, pulled him to pieces and ate him. We were all reduced to a state of horror, not knowing what to do. We gazed at each other in dismay and stupefaction.

"When he had eaten his fill, he went up into a verandah and opened a jar, from which he drank some kind of spirit. After drinking it he uttered the most gruesome and awful noises; his face grew very red and he lay down and slept. His snorings were like the roarings of the thunder.

"We planned then to make our escape, and so tried to open the great gate; but one leaf was about twenty-four feet across, and so thick and heavy that with all our strength we could not move it. The walls, too, were a hundred and fifty feet high, and so we could do nothing with them. We were like fish in a pot—beyond all possible way of escape. We held each other's hands and cried.

"Among us one man thought of this plan: We had a knife and he took it, and while the monster was drunk and asleep, decided to stab his eyes out, and cut his throat. We said in reply, 'We are all doomed to death anyway; let's try'; and we made our way up on the verandah and stabbed his eyes. He gave an awful roar, and struck out on all sides to catch us. We rushed here and there, making our escape out of the court back into the rear garden. There were in this enclosure pigs and sheep, about sixty of them in all. There we rushed, in among the pigs and sheep.

"He floundered about, waving his two arms after us, but not one of us did he get hold of; we were all mixed up—sheep, pigs, and people. When he did catch anything it was a sheep; and when it was not a sheep it was a pig. So he opened the front gate to send all the animals out.

"We then each of us took a pig or sheep on the back and made straight for the gate. The monster felt each, and finding it a pig or a sheep, let it go. Then we all got out and rushed for the boat.

"A little later he came and sat on the bank and roared his threatenings at us. A lot of other giants came at his call. They took steps of thirty feet or so, came racing after us, caught the boat and made it fast; but we took axes and struck at the hands that held it, and so got free at last and out to the open sea.

"Again a great wind arose, and we ran on to the rocks and were all destroyed. Every one was engulfed in the sea and drowned; I alone got hold of a piece of boat-timber and lived. Then there was a horrible fish from the sea that came swimming after me and bit off my legs. At last I drifted back home and here I am.

"When I think of it still, my teeth are cold and my bones shiver. My Eight Lucky Stars are very bad, that's why it happened to me."

CHAPTER XXIII
THE STONE GIANTESS
North American Indian[299:1]

In bygone times it was customary for a hunter's squaw to accompany her husband when he sought the chase. A dutiful wife on these occasions would carry home the game killed by the hunter and dress and cook it for him.

There was once a chief among the Iroquois who was a very skilful hunter. In all his expeditions his wife was his companion and helper. On one excursion he found such large quantities of game that he built a wigwam at the place, and settled there for some time with his wife and child.

One day he struck out on a new track, while his wife followed the path they had taken on the previous day, in order to gather the game killed then. As the woman turned her steps homeward after a hard day's work she heard the sound of another woman's voice inside the hut. Filled with surprise she entered, but found to her consternation that her visitor was no other than a Stone Giantess.

(The Stone Giants were a strange and terrible race, whose bodies were all fashioned of solid stone; they once attacked the Iroquois, meaning to exterminate them completely, but were defeated with the help of the West Wind.)

To add to her alarm, she saw that the creature had in her arms the chief's baby. While the mother stood in the doorway, wondering how she could rescue her child from the clutches of the giantess, the latter said in a gentle and soothing voice: "Do not be afraid; come inside."

The hunter's wife hesitated no longer, but boldly entered the wigwam. Once inside, her fear changed to pity, for the giantess was evidently much worn with trouble and fatigue. She told the hunter's wife, who was kindly and sympathetic, how she had travelled from the land of the Stone Giants, fleeing from her cruel husband, who had sought to kill her, and how she had finally taken shelter in the solitary wigwam. She besought the young woman to let her remain for a while, promising to assist her in her daily tasks. She also said she was very hungry, but warned her hostess that she must be exceedingly careful about the food she gave her. It must not be raw or at all underdone, for if once she tasted blood she might wish to kill the hunter and his wife and child.

So the wife prepared some food for her, taking care it was thoroughly cooked, and the two sat down to dine together. The Stone Giantess knew that the woman was in the habit of carrying home the game, and she now declared she would do it in her stead. Moreover, she said she already knew where it was to be found, and insisted on setting out for it at once. She very shortly returned, bearing in one hand a load of game which four men could scarcely have carried, and the woman recognized in her a very valuable assistant.

The time of the hunter's return drew near, and the Stone Giantess bade the woman go out and meet her husband and tell him of her visitor. The man was very well pleased to learn how the newcomer had helped his wife, and he gave her a hearty welcome. In the morning he went out hunting as usual. When he had disappeared from sight in the forest, the giantess turned quickly to the woman and said:

"I have a secret to tell you. My cruel husband is after me, and in three days he will arrive here. On the third day your husband must remain at home and help me to slay him."

When the third day came round the hunter remained at home, obedient to the instructions of his guest.

"Now," said the giantess at last, "I hear him coming. You must both help me to hold him. Strike him where I bid you, and we shall certainly kill him."

The hunter and his wife were seized with terror when a great commotion outside announced the arrival of the Stone Giant, but the firmness and courage of the giantess reassured them, and with something like calmness they awaited the monster's approach. Directly he came in sight, the giantess rushed forward, grappled with him, and threw him to the ground.

"Strike him on the arms!" she cried to the others. "Now on the nape of the neck!"

The trembling couple obeyed, and very shortly they had succeeded in killing the huge creature.

"I will go and bury him," said the giantess. And that was the end of the Stone Giant.

The strange guest stayed on in the wigwam till the time came for the hunter and his family to go back to the settlement, when she announced her intention of returning to her own people.

"My husband is dead," said she; "I have no longer anything to fear."

Thus, having bid them farewell, she departed.

Part IV
SOME REAL GIANTS, and WHAT SCIENCE HAS LEARNED ABOUT THEM

Giant gods and demigods loom large in the myths of every land—in India, China and Arabia, as well as Greece and Scandinavaia. Many records follow of "real" giants, during the seven or eight thousand years since the first flashes of history. But it needs to be stated at once that here, as in many other matters, exactness of facts is a very modern quality.

Thus, when Pliny tells us that Gabbara, whom the Emperor Claudius brought from Arabia, was nine feet, nine inches tall, we can only be sure that he was probably the largest human being in Rome at that time. And a suspicious number of these early tall men were seen through the mist of reverence due to kingly station and power.

A notable company these king-giants would make: Sesochris of Egypt, perhaps 4000 B. C., who "passed for a giant"; King Saul, the gigantic youth of the tribe of Benjamin chosen by lot to reign over Israel; Maximinus, Thracian shepherd, fierce gladiator, and then savage Emperor of Rome, who, Capitolinus declares, was over eight feet tall, wore his wife's bracelet for a finger-ring, could break a horse's jaw with his fist or outpull a chariot team, and was in the habit of draining a six gallon amphora of wine and consuming forty pounds of meat a day; Harold Hardrada, Viking rover, Mediterranean conqueror, and King of Norway, whose height was "five ells" (ten feet!); Emperor Maximilian of Germany, and many another.

A regiment of formidable warriors would follow these rulers, such as the huge grenadiers of King Frederick William of Prussia and of Peter the Great. The Elector of Brandenburg, too, had in the 16th Century a famous soldier named Michel, reputed to be eight feet tall—a worthy descendant of that giant Swabian, Ænother, renowned in the army of Charlemagne, who swam rushing rivers dragging his horse after him, looked down upon his enemies as "little frogs," and would spit several at once like birds on his weapon.

Frederick William developed a theory that he could establish a new race of physical marvels by intermarrying his huge guards with women of phenomenal size, and he used to busy himself greatly over such matches.

He had little success. The giant as a fighter passed swiftly away before cannon, muskets and pistols. It was not long before he was merely a prodigy to draw the curious crowd.

CHAPTER XXIV
SOME REAL GIANTS

To be sure, one may read in the histories and biographies that the Roman Emperors Maximinus and Jovianus, and Charlemagne, and Emperor Maximilian of Germany were eight-and-a-half or nine feet. But one cannot measure even live Emperors, unfortunately, much less long dead ones. Many a traveller asserted that he had seen with his own eyes scores of Patagonian savages ranging from nine to eleven feet; yet as soon as careful measurements were made these dwindled to a maximum of something under seven. And the vast number of "giants' bones" dug up from time to time, indicating men of nine feet and upward, have practically all been shown to be those of great animals.

One of the most notable characteristics about the giant is a certain shrinking tendency before the camera and the tape. In the last twenty years or so a group of alert savants, especially in France, have been gathering authoritative biological observations upon all the subjects possible; and it is wise to recall that only such exact scientific records can be relied on.

For, apart from pride, there is a vast deal of money involved in a few extra inches for the show giant. For instance, Antoine Hugo, announced as the tallest man, died in 1917 after having made quite a fortune in America; and it was stated that a "freak" promoter would pay a premium of $400 an inch, for any one who could show a greater stature than Hugo! That is to say, he would give nearly $3000 for a nine-foot giant—besides paying the giant himself something like $1500 to $2000 a week. Whereas Hugo's brother, who was only a couple of inches shorter than he, was not in demand in the United States, which calls for only "champions" in the freak class.

Apparently the tallest man on record was Machnow, a Russian, who was born at Witebsk about 1882, was exhibited in London in 1905, in the United States, Germany, Holland, and elsewhere, and died around the age of thirty.

None of his family was exceptionally tall, and he himself was a normal child up to the age of four. Then he began to grow very rapidly, not eating a great deal, but sometimes sleeping for twenty-four hours at a time. At fifteen he was about five feet two; at twenty-two, according to Professor Luschau and Lissauer he was seven feet and ten inches. When he appeared in London next year, he was credited with nine feet three inches, and the most conservative of British encyclopædias accepts this figure. In the show world he was universally taken as the "champion," with a figure of eight feet seven inches. It seems beyond question that he was over eight and a half and under nine feet; his weight was given as 360 pounds.

The champion in 1920 was George Auger, credited with eight feet four inches, who is an American and affects frontier costume. Then there was the famous smiling Chinaman, Chang, who exhibited his eight feet or so to nearly the whole world for a long period beginning about the end of the American Civil War.

A generation back there were in the eight-foot class the Austrian Winkelmeier; Paul Marie Elizabeth Wehde, born at Ben-Rendorf in Thuringia, who was called "The Queen of the Amazons" and was handsome enough to appear with success at the London Alhambra in a review called "Babil and Bijou"; Ben Hicks, "the Denver Steeple"; and, a little smaller, Captain Martin Van Buren Bates of Kentucky, who married in London in 1871 Miss Anna Swan, of Nova Scotia, who was three inches taller than himself—they were celebrated as the tallest bride and groom in the world—scoring fourteen feet eight inches between them, while the captain's weight of 450 pounds made him a notable figure.

Public curiosity regarding the very tall men is by no means modern. Fifteen hundred years ago a poor giant in Rome was almost killed by the press of people crowding about to get a sight of him; but there was a special outbreak of such prodigies during the 18th century, particularly in England.[308:1] Three of the most celebrated of these were from Ireland.

First came Cornelius MacGrath, born near the silver mines in Tipperary in 1736. Neither his parents nor their other children were remarkable in size; but when Cornelius visited Cork at the age of sixteen, a regular mob followed him through the streets, since he towered already head and shoulders above other men.

It appeared that the year before Cornelius was much troubled with pains in his limbs; and thinking them rheumatic he would bathe in salt water for a cure; but they were "growing pains" of a rare sort, for during that year he shot up some eighteen inches.

Since this rapid growth caused him partially to lose the use of his limbs, Dr. Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne, took the youngster into his house for a month or more, and had him treated so successfully that he regained his powers.

"His hand was then as large as a middling-sized shoulder of mutton, which joint he could cover with that member. The last of his shoes, which he carried about with him, measured fifteen inches in length."

This charity of the worthy Bishop was ill rewarded. There grew up a legend (which got into the newspapers and into Watkinson's "Philosophical Survey of Ireland") that Bishop Berkeley, from an inhuman scientific desire to experiment in giant-making, had taken a poor orphan, and by some mysterious course of feeding, had caused him to shoot up to the height of seven feet.

MacGrath kept on growing until at the age of thirty he measured seven feet eight inches; and he created a sensation in London, Paris and other European capitals, distracting attention from Cajanus, the great Swede, who was taller but not so well proportioned. His body was finally stolen by medical students of Trinity College, on the day on which he was to have been "waked."

"This is said to have been the origin of the feud between the students and the coal-porters of Dublin, which has continued to this day (1868)." He was a great friend of the students, and he used to raise by the collar of his coat and hold out at arm's length, for a long time, a small-sized student named Hare, who was father of the late Dr. Hare, F.T.C.D. Mr. Hare one day ran between MacGrath's legs, and the giant strained himself in recovering his balance, from which accident he failed in health, and ultimately died. His skeleton is preserved at Trinity College.

Next there came a Cork man, James MacDonald, who was first exhibited, served as a grenadier for thirty years, then became a day laborer, and died, according to the Annual Register for 1760 at the age of 117! (which is nearly three times the average of giants, either modern or in those—for them—unwholesome days of chivalry).

A little later Charles Byrne, who called himself O'Brien, eclipsed both these notables. He came to London in 1782, as witness this announcement:

"Irish Giant. To be seen this, and every day this week, in his large elegant room, at the cane-shop, next door to late Cox's Museum, Spring Garden, Mr. Byrne, the surprising Irish Giant, who is allowed to be the tallest man in the world; his height is eight feet two inches, and in full proportion accordingly; only 21 years of age. His stay will not be long in London, as he proposes shortly to visit the Continent. The nobility and gentry are requested to take notice, there was a man showed himself for some time past at the top of the Haymarket, and Piccadilly, who advertised and endeavored to impose himself upon the public for the Irish Giant; Mr. Byrne begs leave to assure them it was an imposition, as he is the only Irish Giant, and never was in this metropolis before Thursday the 11th inst. Hours of admittance every day, Sundays excepted, from 11 till 3, and from 5 till 8, at half-a-crown each person."

Poor Patrick had a rather unhappy time of it, in spite of the furore attending his appearance during the short year when he stood "as the most extraordinary production of the human species ever beheld since the days of Goliath."

He got to drinking; and visiting the Black Horse Tavern one night was robbed of all the fruits of his year's success—which he carried in two banknotes, one for £700, one for £70.

Then he became so fearful that the surgeons would get his body for dissection that he begged his remains should be thrown into the sea. The London newspapers, during the summer of the consummation of American Independence, were agog with wild tales of the plots to secure the giant's body after death.

Says one: "The whole tribe of surgeons put in a claim for the poor departed Irish Giant, and surrounded his house just as Greenland harpooners would an enormous whale. One of them has gone so far as to have a niche made for himself in the giant's coffin, in order to his being ready at hand on 'the witching time of night, when churchyards yawn.'"

Another tale was that a rival party had equipped itself with diving-bells to salvage the prodigy from the river, where it was to be sunk at the Downs in twenty fathoms of water. A third said the undertakers had been offered a bribe of 800 guineas.

Whatever the facts, the huge skeleton was for a century a treasured possession of the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, in London.

Spurred on by Byrne's reception, Patrick Cotter, of Kinsale, appeared presently. He also took the name of O'Brien and admitted himself to be a descendant of Brian Boru. He soon eclipsed all rival pretenders, and in the twenty years before his death accumulated a competence. Many were the stories told of him.

He used to travel in a carriage built especially for him, with a sort of well in the floor to hold his legs. One evening the carriage was stopped by a highwayman. As Cotter slowly rose to look out, the robber saw this huge figure rising apparently endlessly, and, struck with panic, he dropped his pistol, clapped spurs to his horse and galloped away.

Then he liked to do such things as startle the watchmen by reaching up to a street lamp and taking off the cover to light his pipe; or to wager £10 that he would kiss a pretty girl at an upstairs window as he walked past.

Some half a century back a gentleman wrote to one of the magazines that he possessed the giant's gold watch, which weighed a pound, and had his name engraved in it, and was still in good running order.

Rather more interesting than these show giants were the corps of gigantic guards, such as those maintained for half a century at Potsdam by the Prussian kings. (Even James I had a door-keeper, Walter Parsons, about seven-and-a-half feet tall; and Cromwell boasted another, Daniel, of the same size, who became insane from religious ecstasy.) These huge soldiers were gathered with great care, from all countries, the tallest being seven feet six inches; and since they were well built athletic men they made a most impressive appearance.

King Frederick William, says Voltaire, "armed with a huge sergeant's cane, marched forth every day to review his regiment of giants. These giants were his greatest delight, and the things for which he went to the heaviest expense.

"The men who stood in the first rank of this regiment were none of them less than seven feet high, and he sent to purchase them from the farthest parts of Europe to the borders of Asia. I have seen some of them since his death. The king, his son, who loved handsome, not gigantic men, had given those I saw to the queen, his wife, to serve in quality of Heiduques. I remember that they accompanied the old state coach which preceded the Marquis de Beauvau, who came to compliment the king, in the month of November, 1740. The late king, Frederick William, who had formerly sold all the magnificent furniture left by his father, never could find a purchaser for that enormous engilded coach. The Heiduques, who walked on each side to support it in case it should fall, shook hands with each other over the roof."

A pleasant exception in character was one Antony Payne of Cornwall, a region always famous for tall men. (In fact the learned author of a "History of Oxfordshire" in 1676 was strongly of the opinion that a huge Cornish skeleton discovered in his time was that of the famous Arabian giant celebrated by Pliny, Gabbara, and that he had doubtless been brought to Britain by the Emperor Claudius.)

Tony Payne was reputed to measure four inches over seven feet. He was a faithful follower of the Stowe family, as noted for intelligence, vigor and good humor as for size, and fought with distinction in the royal army during the Great Rebellion; after the Restoration Charles II had his portrait painted by Kneller. One Christmas Eve he sent a boy with a donkey to bring in wood from the forest; going out after a while to look for him, he found the youth loitering along, whereupon Payne picked up the loaded donkey and carried it back to the castle. He lived to an old age and left behind him a reputation for spirit, ability and loyalty to his ideals which seems rare enough among physical prodigies.

Many historical figures have been at least on the border line of gianthood: William of Scotland, Edward III, Godefroy of Bouillon, Philip the Long, Fairfax, Baron Barford, Kléber, Rochester, Charles II's favorite, Gall, Brillat-Savarin, Benjamin Constant, the painter David, and others were men of quite extraordinary stature—just how tall we cannot, unfortunately, find out.

But the facts seem to be that at any one time one could come pretty near counting on one's fingers all the people in the world who really measured over eight feet in height.

CHAPTER XXV
WHAT SCIENCE HAS LEARNED ABOUT GIANTS

Perhaps, after all, it is just as well that Roland and Launcelot and Amadis and Guy of Warwick exterminated the poor creatures.

We can for more reasons than one afford to smile at that solemn French Academician, who just two centuries ago worked out a table to prove the shrinkage of the human stature since ancient times. Said M. Henrion, here is the tabular record:

And he strove to convince the world that men for their wickedness must have shrunk to nothing at all in a few more centuries; but the appearance of the Messiah during the epoch of the Roman Emperor stopped the degeneration and fixed the normal height at what it then was!

However, if our bodies today cannot be more than nine feet tall at the uttermost—there is no limit on our minds. They can scale the heavens where the giant brood failed. They can be as lofty as we really desire.

It remains quite open to us moderns to be giants in intellect, and energy, and true progress, and helpfulness toward our weaker brethren.