By the Elizabethan period, jesters were beginning to move away from performing in houses to becoming comic actors on the stage and by the 17th century, it was becoming quite dangerous to have a royal patron, as Jeffrey Hudson was to discover. Jeffrey was a talented ‘dwarf jester’ who was encountered by Charles I when the jester jumped out from under a pie crust. Jeffrey travelled with Queen Henrietta Maria when she fled to Holland and returned with her to England to fight on horseback for the royalists during the Civil War. In spite of his size, he was skilled horseman and solider. Ever loyal to the crown, he helped to get the queen back to safety in France. However, a few months later, the brother of Lord Croft who was captain of the Queen’s guard insulted Jeffrey over his height. The dwarf challenged him to a duel and shot him dead. The queen had no choice but to banish Jeffrey. On his voyage of exile, he was captured and sold into slavery. Bizarrely on his eventual return to England (if it was the same man), he was found to have gained a foot in height and in a further twist in 1679, he was accused of conspiracy in a ‘papist plot’. He was finally released from prison in 1682 aged 63, dying shortly afterwards.