He also gave him a coach, drawn by six small mice.
The Queen was so enraged at the honor paid to Sir Thomas that she
resolved to ruin him, and told the King that the little knight had
been saucy to her.
The King sent for Tom in great haste, but being fully aware of the
danger of royal anger, he crept into an empty snail-shell, where he
lay for a long time, until he was almost starved with hunger; but at
last he ventured to peep out, and seeing a fine large butterfly on
the ground, near his hiding-place, he approached very cautiously, and
getting himself placed astride on it, was immediately carried up into
the air. The butterfly flew with him from tree to tree and from field
to field, and at last he returned to the court, where the King and
nobility all strove to catch him; but at last poor Tom fell from his
seat into a watering-pot, in which he was almost drowned.
When the Queen saw him she was in a rage, and said he should be
beheaded; and he was again put into a mouse-trap until the time of his
execution.
However, a cat, observing something alive in the trap, patted it about
till the wires broke, and set Thomas at liberty.
The King received Tom again into favor, which he did not live to
enjoy, for a large spider one day attacked him; and although he drew
his sword and fought well, yet the spider's poisonous breath at last
overcame him:
"He fell dead on the ground where he stood,
And the spider suck'd every drop of his blood.
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