THE GIANT HOK-BRAS
The construction of the Noah's Ark.
Hok-Bras could not shout: enough! enough! to return to his natural size; and besides, if he had shrunk, the vessel would have ruptured his chest.
So there he is, running, running like a man possessed, surveying plains, mountains, and valleys, with eighty cannons in his throat...
Finally, he calmed down a little and said to himself quite naturally:
"My aunt will get me out of this mess."
And he began to run in the direction of the Monts d'Arrée, which he had seen born and which was going to become his tomb... Yes, at that time, as always, ambition destroyed men; by dint of growing, they fall from higher heights and can no longer get up, burdened as they are with the too-heavy weight of their insatiable lust.
Hok-Bras therefore sat down for a moment to rest on Mont Saint-Michel, because his three-decked ship made it difficult for him to make a long journey. Then, when he had rested, instead of going around the marsh, he wanted to cross it to go faster.
Unfortunately, he counted without the weight of his eighty cannons. In fact, he had not taken four strides in the middle of a large marsh that he felt himself sinking, sinking, to the point where he could no longer remove his legs. Then, in his terrible efforts, he stumbled, and his immense body, carried by the weight of the eighty cannons, fell on the mountain.
There was, it is said, an earthquake, and at Huelgoat the fairy was terrified.
Hok-Bras had broken his head when he fell on the rocks he had piled up himself. His godmother, mad with grief, ran to him and tried in vain to bring him back to life; but not being able to succeed, she retired to Saint-Herbot, where today her shadow returns to wander along the banks of the torrents...
Now, it would take too long to report everything that is said about the corpse of Hok-Bras.
It is claimed that seeing the flood coming and not finding beams strong enough to build the Ark, Noah, who had heard of the Breton colossus, came to the Monts d'Arrée, sawed off the beard of the deceased giant, and made the frames of the supreme ship.
Noah also wanted, out of curiosity or to weigh his ark, to take some Hok-Bras teeth; for each one, he needed three vigorous sailors.
Many other things are said about the gigantic builder of our mountains... But here ends this authentic story, a story which undoubtedly showed you that the Bretons are not little boys!
A tooth of Hok-Bras
Source: Le Géant Hok-Bras from the French book Contes et légendes de Basse-Bretagne published in 1891.
Next Tale: God's Will
Hello, my name is Vincent Celier.
I am writing translations of folk tales that I found in public domain French books, so that people who do not understand French may enjoy them too.
And now we end this very weird tale, that is claimed to be authentic, with the death of the giant Hok-Bras.
It is strange to learn that before Noah constructed the Ark, there existed three-deck ships with 80 canons!
Every year, my colleagues from the École Navale exchanged good wishes for the New Year.
This year, one of them reminded us of an episode that happened in 1970.
The whole promotion went on ships to visit the Britannia Royal Naval College, the British equivalent of the École Navale.
We were invited by the British cadets to their bar. We noticed that there were inscriptions on the ceiling. So, we decided that we wanted to make our own inscription. But the cadets prevented us from doing that.
As it was impossible then, one of us made sure that one of the windows of a room close to the bar could be opened from the outside.
At 4 PM, two of my colleagues came back to the Royal College, climbed through the window, evaded the cleaning crew, and went into the bar. With a stool, on a chair, itself on a table, one of them was able to make a small inscription. As this guy is decided and the other one does not remember, we will probably never know what the inscription was.
When the British cadets came later to visit the École Navale, they tried to make their own inscription on the ceiling of our bar, but of course, we prevented them from doing so.
-- Vincent Celier