It happened that the Godmother turned and saw Speckle just as she bit the thistle. »Oh Tom, Tom, you poor little child,« she cried, running towards Speckle as fast as she could. She thought surely that the cow had swallowed him and that would be the last that she should see of him; but, as she came close, she heard a little voice calling from Speckle's back, »Here I am, Godmother, here I am.«
She took him carefully in her hand and carried him off to the meadow where she was at work. There she seated him in one of her wooden shoes and saying, »Now you must not move from here until I come,« off she went to her work again; for she had to hurry with the hay, as dark clouds were coming up in the sky.
Little Tom sat quietly in the shoe for a while. It was like a big hut to him. Then he thought he would have a look around, so he clambered down the side of the shoe and started to walk a little way on the meadow, when a big rain drop splashed on him and made him all wet. He was greatly surprised, as he did not know what it was that came down in such a flood and splashed on the ground all around him. With the rain came hail stones, like rocks of ice, larger than Tom's head. They bounded away and then came down so thickly, that Tom did not know which way to run.
He turned back toward the shoe and ran for it with all his might, but on the way a great hailstone hit him and nearly killed him. He managed to clamber over the side of the shoe and fall inside, fainting. With such strength as he had left, he crawled away up in the toe of the shoe where he could hide. The hail rattled down like cannon balls and very soon the whole shoe was filled with the little balls of ice. When the Godmother came hurrying up, she could hardly find Tom who was curled up among the hailstones in the far end of the shoe, half frozen and completely exhausted. Taking him carefully in her warm hand, she hurried home with him.
Thus, his expedition with his Godmother turned out very sadly and she saw that, even when he was with her, he could not be sure of his life.
When they had thoroughly dried themselves and eaten their supper, the Godmother said, »There is nothing to do, Tom, except for you to stay at home and study and not try for yourself to see the wonders of the world. It is a miracle that you did not die today.«
Little Tom himself realized that, outside in the great world, there was no happiness for him and he readily promised that he would stay at home. But it made him sad to think how terrible and cruel the world is, and that in it there seemed to be no safe place for him.
