Project Gutenberg's The History Of Tom Thumb and Other Stories., by Anonymous

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Title: The History Of Tom Thumb and Other Stories.

Author: Anonymous

Release Date: February 15, 2004 [EBook #11092]

Language: English

Character set encoding: US-ASCII

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TOM THUMB

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THE HISTORY OF TOM THUMB _AND OTHER STORIES_

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_Profusely Illustrated_

THE HISTORY OF TOM THUMB

In the days of King Arthur, Merlin, the famous enchanter, was out on a
journey, and stopped one day at the cottage of an honest ploughman to
ask for refreshment. The ploughman's wife brought him some milk in a
wooden bowl, and some brown bread on a wooden platter.

Merlin could not help observing that, although everything within the
cottage was particularly neat and in good order, the ploughman and
his wife had the most sorrowful air, so he questioned them about the
cause of their distress, and learned that they were miserable because
they had no children. The poor woman declared that she would be the
happiest creature in the world if she had but a son, although he were
no bigger than his father's thumb. Merlin was very much amused at the
thought of a boy no bigger than a man's thumb; and as soon as he
returned home he sent for the Queen of the Fairies and related to her
the desire of the ploughman and his wife to have a son the size of his
father's thumb.

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The Queen of the Fairies promised that their wish should be granted.
And so it happened one day that the ploughman's wife had a son
exactly of the size of his father's thumb. While the mother was
sitting up in bed, admiring the child, the Queen of the Fairies
appeared, and kissed the infant, giving it the name of Tom Thumb, and
summoned several fairies to clothe her little favorite.

Tom never grew any bigger; but, as he grew older, he became very
cunning and sly, which his mother did not sufficiently correct him
for; so that, when he was old enough to play with the boys