Hundreds of years earlier, in the time of Mrs Grimble and the others, two eight year old  boys named Snip and Lemuel found and climbed the beanstalk and emerged in Mrs Grimble’s garden. They walked a little way and hid themselves in the garden, just near the top of the beanstalk. Shortly afterwards they saw a giant woman and a normal sized woman coming out of the castle. The giantess was carrying the normal sized woman on what seemed like a normal sized swing with a long piece of rope (or giant string) tied to the top of the swing support.

“Thank you for agreeing to help me, Mrs Grimble,” said the normal sized woman, as the giantess approached the top of the beanstalk.

“You’re welcome, Mrs Weaver,” said the giantess Mrs Grimble, “I think it will be beneficial for both of us. Just give a tug on the rope, when the time comes, and I’ll hear the bell.”

Mrs Grimble farewelled the normal sized Mrs Weaver, and lowered her down on the swing, beside the beanstalk, presumably until she reached the bottom. Mrs Grimble ran the other end of the string over a sapling and hung a bell on it. The slightest pull from below would make the bell ring audibly to Mrs Grimble, when she was back inside her castle.

The two boys waited until the giantess had gone inside, and then set off to explore the giant land separately. Lemuel headed out towards the edge of the valley, while Snip went into the forest, passed a giant berry patch and kept walking. Deep in the forest, he came upon a gigantic woman.

“Well, if it isn’t another little boy!” she said, “How do you like the berries?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t have any,” said the boy, “I’m Snip.”

“Just as well,” she said, reaching down and picking him up, “I’m Olda, and I made short work of the last little boy I caught in my berry patch. It so happens I have a job for you to do before I let you go.”

She began walking with him enclosed in her giant fingers. Snip was rather curious to know what she meant by the phrase “short work.”

“What happened to the other boy?” he asked at last, after working up the nerve to overcome his apprehensions.

“I swallowed him alive,” she said, “He went down to my tummy and his tasty meat became part of it. That’s exactly where you’ll be if you give me any cheek.”

Snip was still in the giantess’s hand, which was rather close to her huge stomach. He looked at it with a strange fascination beginning to form in his mind. No adventure he could ever have contemplated before seemed to excite him as much as the thought of this giant woman going ahead with her threat to swallow him whole. He gaped up at her neck and her mouth. Then he realised the folly of his thoughts. The effects would be far more serious for him than they would for the giantess. He decided that he had better find out what job she had in mind for him, and get it over with as quickly as possible.

Olda reached her giant house, took him inside, and set him down on a table beside a huge pile of giant buttons.

“As you can see, these buttons are not easy for my fingers to pick up,” she said, “I want you to sort them all into separate piles, according to their colours. See that you do it quickly and properly, or I’ll warm you in my oven and swallow you whole for my dinner!”