"I came here to kill him. I shall be a coward and turn into a mortal if I don't kill him," she said to herself. "But if I kill him he will never finish his masterpiece. Supposing I don't kill him after all, but help him out, then he can finish his work and be happy." She looked at him again and shuddered.

"Oh, if I help him out he will eat me!" she cried. "I _will_ be brave and kill him."

So she shouldered the thorn, and poised herself once more upon the edge of the bowl.

The Spider was still struggling, but more feebly, and Miss m.u.f.fet could hear him muttering to himself, "Grey, threaded with silver and sparkling dewdrops, oh, my masterpiece!"

"No!" she said, flinging the spear down on the tuft behind her. "I _can't_ kill him. What does it matter if I turn into a mortal. I have never done any work or made a masterpiece. Let him eat me if he likes.

I will _save_ him!"

"Here!" she said in a louder voice. "Give me one of your feet, and I will pull you out."

"Ugh! how ugly he is," she continued to herself, as the Spider drew nearer and lifted up one of his feet. She knelt down on the brim, and stretching out her tiny hands seized the foot, and pulled him slowly up the side of the bowl.

"Now he'll eat me!" she thought, as he stood for a moment shaking himself on the edge.

But no, without a word he was gone, scuttling straight off to the barn as fast as he could run. Was it possible that _he_ was afraid of _her_!

Miss m.u.f.fet looked round. Behind her on the ground lay the big thorn with which she had set out to kill the Spider.

"I wonder it I have been a coward to spare him after all," she said as she flew home. "Anyway, I shall know to-morrow morning. Perhaps this is the last fly I shall ever have, and when I wake up to-morrow I shall be just an ordinary little girl with no wings, and a serge frock and pigtails." And murmuring "Coward, coward, I shall be an ordinary little girl to-morrow!" she fell asleep.

But when she woke up to-morrow morning she found she was a fairy still--wings and all; and moreover she found spread over her the daintiest and most beautiful counterpane in the world, made of grey threads woven with silver and diamented with dewdrops all glistening and quivering in the morning sunlight. It was indeed a masterpiece!

"Look what a lovely spider's web there is under the gooseberry bush!"

said the farmer's little girl, when she came to fetch the empty bowl of curds and whey that morning.

p.u.s.s.y CAT, p.u.s.s.y CAT

"_The man who loses his opportunity loses himself_"

"p.u.s.s.y Cat, p.u.s.s.y Cat, where have you been?"

"I've been to London to visit the Queen."

"p.u.s.s.y Cat, p.u.s.s.y Cat, what did you there?"

"I frightened a little mouse under her chair."

You would never think to look at Thomas now, as he lies blinking in front of the fire, that he once had the chance of being King of England!

To us, Thomas only looks like an ordinary, sleek, well-fed, tabby cat.

But then, you see, you don't know Thomas' Private History. Thomas himself is usually too sleepy to think about his early adventures now, but time was, when the mere mention of the Queen's name, would start him off purring at the thought of what might have been!

It was a long time ago, when Thomas was just emerging from the kitten stage, that his Private History really began. It started one evening when mother was reading the children the story of the White Cat in front of the nursery fire before they went to bed. Thomas, who had been more than usually frisky all day, was taking a little repose on the hearthrug, and as the story was about a cat, had condescended to listen.

You all know the story--how the White Cat, though in the form of a cat, was really a princess, and how she married the prince, and changed back into a princess at last.

Thomas listened enthralled, and from the moment the story ended, his Private History began.

For, at the close of the story, Thomas had quite come to the conclusion that he, too, was no ordinary cat. No! As the White Cat in the story was really a princess, Thomas was now convinced that he was really a prince, and only waiting to marry a princess, or better still, a Queen, to show himself in his true guise.

It was soon after this idea entered his head that Thomas became almost intolerable.

The airs he a.s.sumed! The graces he put on! The arts he practised!

The condescension of his smile! The upward tilt of his nose! The twirl of his moustachios! The defiant angle of his tail!

He began, also, to exercise his voice at night. "Practising serenades," was how he described it to the stable cat, for whom he had the utmost contempt, though he was not above showing off his fine person in front of her now and then.

It was about this time, too, that Thomas started on a long series of nightly prowls. "Quests of adventure," was how he described them. He also developed a habit of strolling in about breakfast time, and listening to Papa reading aloud the morning paper; but it was only in the Court news that he really took any interest. From this he gathered that it was in London that the Queen lived, and he became filled with a burning desire to go to London. Accordingly he made himself more than usually agreeable to the family, in the hopes that they would take him with them when they paid their yearly visit to town.

All this, of course, was Thomas' Private History at this time. To the family he was only known as "an excellent mouser," and "so good with the children."

This troubled Thomas not a little.

It also troubled him that he was so exceedingly fond of mice.

He far preferred them to milk, which was a much more princely diet.

Once, even, the idea just crossed his mind, that, as he was so fond of mice, perhaps he wasn't a prince after all, but only an ordinary tabby cat. This thought he thrust from him with a flick of his tail.

"Just wait till I get to London," he said to himself. "When the Queen sees me she will at once recognise me for what I am," and he twitched his nose contemptuously at the stable cat who was just crossing the yard.

The next day the family went up to London. Thomas, to his great delight, was taken too. "He is such an excellent mouser," Papa had said, and the children, "Oh we can't leave Thomas, he is such a darling."

This had annoyed Thomas, and hurt his dignity. So, just before starting, he went out to say good-bye to the stable cat.

"Good-bye," he said. "I don't suppose you will see me again, or if you do, I don't suppose you will recognise me. I am going up to London to marry the Queen."

The stable cat expressed no surprise at this remarkable statement. She merely winked her yellow eyes and answered nothing.

"I suppose she thinks I am too fine to be spoken to by such as she!"

said Thomas to himself as he stalked away.

The journey up to London was certainly not a success as far as Thomas was concerned.

He was put in a basket. This he considered undignified, as well as uncomfortable, and he took no pains to conceal his feelings. He scratched and spluttered at the side of the basket, and uttered his opinion of the family with no uncertain voice. But n.o.body paid any attention to him.

"Very well," he cried at last. "When I am King of England you won't put me in a basket any more. The next time I go on a journey, it will be in a coach and four."

Then he started thinking of how many mice he had caught last week, and this thought comforted him so much that he curled round and went to sleep for the rest of the journey.

The evening after they arrived, one of the young ladies of the family was to go and see the Queen. Thomas privately decided to go with her.

He did not tell her he was coming too.

"Though, of course, if she knew I was her future King, she would be only too delighted to be going with me," he thought. "All the same, I think I will go quite quietly without any fuss, there will be plenty of time for that afterwards."