here are you, Tommy, my dear Tommy?" said the mother.

"Here, mother, here in the red cow's mouth."

The mother began to cry and wring her hands; but the cow, surprised at
such odd noises in her throat, opened her mouth and let him drop out.
His mother clapped him into her apron and ran home with him.

Tom's father made him a whip of a barley straw to drive the cattle with,
and one day when he was in the field he slipped into a deep furrow. A
raven flying over picked him up with a grain of corn and flew with him
to the top of a giant's castle by the seaside, where he left him; and
old Grumbo, the giant, coming soon after to walk upon his terrace,
swallowed Tom like a pill, clothes and all.

Tom presently made the giant very uncomfortable, and he threw him up
into the sea. A great fish then swallowed him. The fish was soon after
caught, and sent as a present to King Arthur. When it was cut open,
everybody was delighted with little Tom Thumb. The king made him his
dwarf; he was the favorite of the whole court, and by his merry pranks
often amused the queen and the knights of the Round Table.

The king, when he rode on horse-back, frequently took Tom in his hand;
and if a shower of rain came on, he used to creep into the king's
waist-coat pocket and sleep till the rain was over. The king also
sometimes questioned Tom concerning his parents; and when Tom informed
his majesty they were very poor people, the king led him into his
treasury and told him he should pay his friends a visit and take with
him as much money as he could carry. Tom procured a little purse, and
putting a threepenny piece into it, with much labor and difficulty got
it upon his back; and, after travelling two days and nights, arrived at
his father's house.

When his mother met him at the door, he was almost tired to death,
having in forty-eight hours traveled almost half a mile with a huge
silver threepence upon his back. Both his parents were glad to see him,
especially when he had brought such an amazing sum of money with him.
They placed him in a walnut-shell by the fireside and feasted him for
three days upon a hazel-nut, which made him sick, for a whole nut
usually served him for a month.

Tom got well, but could not travel because it had rained; therefore his
mother took him in her hand, and with one puff blew him into King
Arthur's court, where Tom entertained the king, queen, and nobility at
tilts and tournaments, at which he exerted himsel