The Tailor of Gloucester Page #2

								

privately in the tea-pot, and spit and
growled at the tailor; and if Simpkin
had been able to talk, he would have
asked: "Where is my MOUSE?"

"Alack, I am undone!" said the
Tailor of Gloucester, and went sadly
to bed.

All that night long Simpkin hunted
and searched through the kitchen,
peeping into cupboards and under the
wainscot, and into the tea-pot where
he had hidden that twist; but still he
found never a mouse!

The poor old tailor was very ill with
a fever, tossing and turning in his
four-post bed; and still in his dreams
he mumbled: "No more twist! no
more twist!"

What should become of the cherry-
coloured coat? Who should come to
sew it, when the window was barred,
and the door was fast locked?

Out-of-doors the market folks went
trudging through the snow to buy
their geese and turkeys, and to bake
their Christmas pies; but there would
be no dinner for Simpkin and the poor
old tailor of Gloucester.

The tailor lay ill for three days and
nights; and then it was Christmas Eve,
and very late at night. And still
Simpkin wanted his mice, and mewed
as he stood beside the four-post bed.

But it is in the old story that all the
beasts can talk in the night between
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in
the morning (though there are very
few folk that can hear them, or know
what it is that they say).

When the Cathedral clock struck
twelve there was an answer--like an
echo of the chimes--and Simpkin
heard it, and came out of the tailor's
door, and wandered about in the
snow.

From all the roofs and gables and
old wooden houses in Gloucester
came a thousand merry voices singing
the old Christmas rhymes--all the old
songs that ever I heard of, and some
that I don't know, like Whittington's
bells.

Under the wooden eaves the
starlings and sparrows sang of
Christmas pies; the jackdaws woke up
in the Cathedral tower; and although
it was the middle of the night the
throstles and robins sang; and air was
quite full of little twittering tunes.

But it was all rather provoking to
poor hungry Simpkin.

From the tailor's ship in Westgate
came a glow of light; and when
Simpkin crept up to peep in at the
window it was full of candles. There
was a snippeting of scissors, and
snappeting of thread; and little mouse
voices sang loudly and gaily:

          "Four-and-twenty tailors
          Went to catch a snail,
          The best man amongst them
          Durst not touch her tail;
          She put out her horns
          Like a little kyloe cow.
          Run, tailors, run!
          Or she'll have you all e'en now!"

Then without a pause the little
mouse voices went on again:

          "Sieve my lady's oatmeal,
          Grind my lady's flour,
          Put it in a chestnut,
          Let it stand an hour--"

"Mew! Mew!" interrupted Simpkin,
and he scratched at the door. But the
key was under the tailor's pillow; he
could not get in.

The little mice only laughed, and
tried another tune--
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