The paddock and the mouse

Upon a time, as Aesop could report,

A little Mouse came to a river side;

She might not wade, her shanks were so short;

She could not swim, she had no horse to ride:

Of verray force behove it her to bide,

And to and fro beside that river deep

She ran, crying with many piteous peep …

We get two animals for the price of one in this medieval poem: a frog and a mouse (‘paddock’ is an old