James and the Giant Peach: Chapters 1–7

Their troubles were all over in a jiffy.

Poor James, on the other hand, was still very much alive, and all at once he found himself alone and frightened in a vast unfriendly world.

They never called him by his real name, but always referred to him as “you disgusting little beast” or “you filthy nuisance” or “you miserable creature,” and they certainly never gave him any toys to play with or any picture books to look at.

They lived—Aunt Sponge, Aunt Spiker, and now James as well—in a queer ramshackle house on the top of a high hill in the south of England.

The garden, which covered the whole of the top of the hill, was large and desolate, and the only tree in the entire place (apart from a clump of dirty old laurel bushes at the far end) was an ancient peach tree that never gave any peaches.

And as time went on, he became sadder and sadder, and more and more lonely, and he used to spend hours every day standing at the bottom of the garden, gazing wistfully at the lovely but forbidden world of woods and fields and ocean that was spread out below him like a magic carpet.

She had a screeching voice and long wet narrow lips, and whenever she got angry or excited, little flecks of spit would come shooting out of her mouth as she talked.

And there they sat, these two ghastly hags, sipping their drinks, and every now and again screaming at James to chop faster and faster.

“I look and smell,” Aunt Sponge declared,
“as lovely as a rose!
Just feast your eyes upon my face, observe my
shapely nose!
Behold my heavenly silky locks!
And if I take off both my socks
You ’ll see my dainty toes.”

Aunt Spiker said, “My
sweet, you cannot win,
Behold my gorgeous curvy shape, my teeth, my
charming grin!
Oh, beauteous me! How I adore
My radiant looks! And please ignore
The pimple on my chin.”

The chopper was a large blunt thing far too heavy for a small boy to use.

Great tears began oozing out of James’s eyes and rolling down his cheeks.

He stopped working and leaned against the chopping-block, overwhelmed by his own unhappiness.

For suddenly, just behind him, James heard a rustling of leaves, and he turned around and saw an old man in a crazy dark-green suit emerging from the bushes.

He was a very small old man, but he had a huge bald head and a face that was covered all over with bristly black whiskers.

“Come closer to me, little boy,” he said, beckoning to James with a finger.

The old man hobbled a step or two nearer, and then he put a hand into the pocket of his jacket and took out a small white paper bag.

The breath smelled musty and stale and slightly mildewed, like air in an old cellar.

The breath smelled musty and stale and slightly mildewed, like air in an old cellar.

Inside it, James could see a mass of tiny green things that looked like little stones or crystals, each one about the size of a grain of rice. They were extraordinarily beautiful, and there was a strange brightness about them, a sort of luminous quality that made them glow and sparkle in the most wonderful way.

And then, my dear, you will feel it churning and boiling in your stomach, and steam will start coming out of your mouth, and immediately after that, marvelous things will start happening to you, fabulous, unbelievable things—and you will never be miserable again in your life.

He swerved away from them so as to go around the other side of the house, but then suddenly, just as he was passing underneath the old peach tree that stood in the middle of the garden, his foot slipped and he fell flat on his face in the grass.

But what was this? They were all sinking into the soil! He could actually see them wriggling and twisting as they burrowed their way downward into the hard earth, and at once he reached out a hand to pick some of them up before it was too late, but they disappeared right under his fingers.

He began scrabbling around frantically in an effort to catch hold of those that were left, but they were too quick for him.

He began scrabbling around frantically in an effort to catch hold of those that were left, but they were too quick for him.

James glanced up and saw Aunt Spiker standing over him, grim and tall and bony, glaring at him through her steel-rimmed spectacles.

“Why don’t we just lower the boy down the well in a bucket and leave him there for the night?” she suggested. “That ought to teach him not to laze around like this the whole day long.”

“That’s a very good wheeze, my dear Sponge. But let’s make him finish chopping up the wood first. Be off with you at once, you hideous brat, and do some work!”

Today and tomorrow and the next day and all the other days as well would be nothing but punishment and pain, unhappiness and despair.

“My dear Sponge,” Aunt Spiker said slowly, winking at her sister and smiling a sly, thin-lipped smile. “There’s a pile of money to be made out of this if only we can handle it right. You wait and see.”