and seized upon Tom, who was writhing with the pain of the hot bath he had taken. He listened to none of his cries and entreaties, but bore him into the hall, declaring that he had detected a trick of the treacherous Saxons, who had sent this little imp to put wasp-stings into the furmity, and so to poison the good King Arthur, whom they could not overcome in fair fight.

King Arthur was at that moment busied in listening to an embassy from Lucius the Emperor, and could not hear the cook's cause. In vain did poor Tom plead, "I am the King's page; I am the son of a true man. Only send to Owen's cottage by the forest." His enemy would but laugh him to scorn, and at last placed him in prison in a mouse-trap.

There lay poor Tom, sad and lonely, thinking how unlike was this to the manner in which he had thought to appear before the King, and wondering whether it were that his gluttony had made him unworthy to appear as a true and loyal servant. By and by, it grew dark, and as night came on, he still lay forgotten there. Presently a voice was heard, "Tom! Tom Thumb, I say," and a droll, freakish face peeped in at him through the wires. "Come with me, Tom, I will slip you out through the bars, and you shall mount behind me on a barley-straw, and we will ride races up and down the chest of the burly cook! Ho! ho! ha! ha!"

But Tom retreated up to the farthest corner of his cage.

"No! no," said he, “I know you! I will have nothing to do

with your pranks.”

"Ho! ho!" laughed Puck.

"We are the king's page, are

we? Fine preferment, to be the sport of each idle knight and dame! What shall you get by it?”

"I shall do my duty," quoth Tom, manfully; but Robin Goodfellow's mocking laugh was the louder. "Little thanks will you gain, little credit! The little mannikin will be their game. Better make game of them!"

Tom began to think so, but he crouched together, and thought of certain words his mother had taught him to strengthen him against elvish sprites.

"What have you gained yet?" continued Puck. "The paltry threepenny? I'll give you hoards of fairy gold! And for toiling home half a mile in three days, I'll teach you to circle the earth in forty minutes." A silver threepenny! Fine gains, forsooth."

"I gained my mother's welcome," said Tom, half crying. Puck answered with a sneering "Ho! ho!" but there was a sound like a shriek in it. Had he not fled from his mother? The sound died off, and Tom was left alone, sobbing and trembling in his corner, but still feeling that he would not part with his human heart for all Puck's powers.

Presently two glaring green lights shone on him, they came nearer and nearer, and a cat crept up to the trap, and began to thrust her claw through the bars to reach the poor captive.

Tom started to the other side, but she was before him; and above, Puck shouted, "She will have you! Now, shall I aid you?

Come with me,

Come with me,

And be free."

"Never in your freedom!" cried Tom.

" At him,

"Ah! ah! we shall have you yet,” cried Puck. Grey Malkin !—at him!" and every time poor Tom had to dart from one side to the other of his prison to avoid the cat's paws, he heard the same mocking shout of derision.

Quite spent, he was almost ready to give up, and fall into the clutches of the cat, when the sound of the first cock crow rang upon his ears, and with a parting "Ho! ho! ho!" Hobgoblin flew away to fairy land, while a mouse, running across the kitchen, caused the cat to forsake Tom for other prey.

He fell asleep from very weariness, and when he awoke, the sun was high up in the sky. He found that the cat had been his friend after all, for her had widened the space between the bars, so that he could creep through them, and thus he found way into the garden.

his

paw

Soon, however, he heard the voice of the cook saying, “The fairies have spirited away yonder little imp by night, but if ever I catch him,"

Without more ado, Tom hid himself in an empty snail-shell that chanced to be near, and waited there till all was quiet, when