After a restless night, Hans rose the next morning with the oddest sensation in the world.  He fancied that the bed was shorter, the chairs lower, and the room smaller, than on the preceding day; but attributing this feeling to the feverish sleep he had had, he proceeded to put on his pantaloons.  With great care he thrust his left leg into its proper division, when, to his horror and amazement, he found that he had grown two feet at least during the night; and that the pantaloons which had fitted so admirably before, were now only knee-breeches.  He rushed to the window with the intention of breaking his neck by a leap into the street, when his eye fell upon the strange customer of the preceding day, who was leaning against the gable-end of the house opposite, quietly smoking his meerschaum.  Hans paused; then thought, and then concluded that having found an appetite, he had repented of his boast at parting, and had called for his teeth.  Being a good-natured lad, Hans shuffled down stairs, and opening the door, called him to come over.  The stranger obeyed the summons, but honourably refused to accept of his teeth, except on the conditions of the wager.  To Hans’ great surprise he seemed perfectly acquainted with the phenomenon of the past night, and good-naturedly offered to go to Stitz, and inform him of the barber’s dilemma.  The stranger departed, and in a few moments the tailor arrived, and having ascertained by his inch measure the truth of Hans’ conjectures, bade him be of good cheer, as he had a suit of clothes which would exactly fit him.  They had been made for a travelling giant, who had either forgotten to call for them, or suspected that Stitz would require the gelt before he gave up the broadcloth.

The tailor was right—­they did fit—­and in an hour afterwards Hans was on his way to the fete.  When he arrived there many of his old friends stood agape for a few moments:  but as stranger things had occurred in Germany than a man growing two feet in one night, they soon ceased to notice the alteration in Hans’ appearance.  Agnes was evidently struck with the improvement of the barber’s figure, and for two whole hours did he enjoy the extreme felicity of making half-a-dozen other young gentlemen miserable, by monopolising the arm and conversation of the beauty of Stocksbawler.  But pleasure, like fine weather, lasts not for ever; and, as Hans and Agnes turned the corner of a path, his eye again encountered the stranger.  Whether it was from fear or dislike he knew not, but his heart seemed to sink, and so did his body; for to his utter dismay, he found that he had shrunk to his original proportions, and that the garment of the giant hung about him in anything but graceful festoons.  He felt that he was a human telescope, that some infernal power could elongate or shut up at pleasure.