when he had his story told he laid down the flail on the stone steps , and bid no one for their lives to touch it . if the king and queen and princess made much of him before they made ten times as much of him now ; but redhead , the mean scruff - hound , stole over , and thought to catch hold of the flail to make an end of him . his fingers hardly touched it , when he let a roar out of him as if heaven and earth were coming together , and kept flinging his arms about and dancing that it was pitiful to look at him . tom run at him as soon as he could rise , caught his hands in his own two , and rubbed them this way and that , and the burning pain left them before you could reckon one . well , the poor fellow , between the pain that was only just gone , and the comfort he was in , had the comicalest face that ever you see ; it was such a mixerum - gatherum of laughing and crying . everyone burst out a laughing -- the princess could not stop no more than the rest -- and then says gilla , or tom , " now , ma'am , if there were fifty halves of you i hope you 'll give me them all . " well , the princess had no mock modesty about her . she looked at her father , and , by my word , she came over to gilla and put her two delicate hands into his two rough ones , and i wish it was myself was in his shoes that day !
touch the fiail .
what did tom bade no one to do ?
what did tom bade no one to do ?