he Spider lived in the barn opposite, and there was a fine
tuft of grass in between, where they sometimes met. The farm people
knew all about fairies, and on Midsummer Eve always put out a bowl of
curds and whey for Miss Muffet in the true old-fashioned style. Miss
Muffet always hoped that the Spider would not see it and get there
first. Oh, Miss Muffet was certainly very much afraid of the Spider!

She was quite sure he had a hundred legs, whereas he had only eight;
quite sure that he was as big as a house, whereas he wasn't as big as
your little finger; and quite sure that he spent his life lying in wait
to eat her up, whereas he was far too busy about his own affairs ever
to think about her at all!

It was on one particular Midsummer Eve that Miss Muffet had her great
adventure with the Spider.

It was a beautiful moonlight night. Miss Muffet crept out from under
the gooseberry bush, and flew across to the tuft of grass. Yes, there
was the bowl of curds and whey as usual. It had never been forgotten
ever since Miss Muffet had come to live under the gooseberry bush.

Miss Muffet tripped up to the bowl, and began to sip the contents,
thinking all the while how glad she was that she was not a mortal,
when----

Plop!

Out of the barn dropped the Spider, close down beside her.

"Can you tell me where the best dewdrops----" he began. But Miss
Muffet only looked once in his direction, and then fled as fast as her
wings could carry her.

Trembling, she reached the gooseberry bush, and then, all of a sudden,
her wings failed her.

"Oh dear," she cried. "I have run away, and been a coward. If I don't
do something very brave at once I shall start turning into a mortal.
Oh, I don't want to be an ordinary little girl and be called Molly or
Dolly, and have to walk everywhere, and go to school, and put my hair
in pig-tails. I must do something brave this minute."

Then her eye fell on the gooseberry bush.

"I know," she said, "I will screw up my courage and kill that spider
dead. I will take a thorn from the gooseberry bush to spear him with."

So, with her tiny hands, she broke off a long thorn from the gooseberry
bush. Then, feeling very brave indeed, she shouldered the thorn and
flew back very slowly to the tuft.

At first she thought the spider had disappeared, as she could not see
him anywhere. But, happening to fly over the bowl of curds and whey,
she saw that he was lying struggling, in the very