little, black Thing. And the King hadn't eaten but a mouthful or two
when he began to laugh, and he laughed so long and so loud that at last
the poor Queen, all lackadaisical as she was, said:

"Why do you laugh so?"

"At something I saw to-day, my love," says the King. "I was out
a-hunting, and by chance I came to a place I'd never been in before. It
was in a wood, and there was an old chalk-pit there, and out of the
chalk-pit there came a queer kind of a sort of a humming, humming noise.
So I got off my hobby to see what made it, and went quite quiet to the
edge of the pit and looked down. And what do you think I saw? The
funniest, queerest, smallest, little, black Thing you ever set eyes
upon. And it had a little spinning-wheel and it was spinning away for
dear life, but the wheel didn't go so fast as its tail, and that span
round and round--_ho-ho-ha-ha!_--you never saw the like. And its little
feet had buckled shoes and bows on them, and they went up and down in a
desperate hurry. And all the time that small, little, black Thing kept
bumming and booming away at these words:

"Name me, name me not,
Who'll guess it's Tom-Tit-Tot."

Well, when she heard these words the Queen nearly jumped out of her
skin for joy; but she managed to say nothing, but ate her supper quite
comfortably.

And she said no word when next morning the small, little, black Thing
came for the flax, though it looked so gleeful and maliceful that she
could hardly help laughing, knowing she had got the better of it. And
when night came and she heard that knocking against the window-panes,
she put on a wry face, and opened the window slowly as if she was
afraid. But that Thing was as bold as brass and came right inside,
grinning from ear to ear. And oh, my goodness! how That's tail was
twirling and whisking!

"Well, my beauty," says That, giving her the five skeins all ready spun,
"what's my name?"

Then she put down her lip, and says, tearful like,
"Is--is--That--Solomon?"

"No, it ain't," laughs That, smirking out of the corner of That's eye.
And the small, little, black Thing came further into the room.

So she tried again--and this time she seemed hardly able to speak for
fright.

"Well--is That--Zebedee?" she says.

"No, it ain't," cried the impet, full of glee. And it came quite close
and stretched out its little black hands to her, and O-oh, ITS
TAIL...!!!

"Take time, my beauty," says That, sort of jeering like, and it