“Do I know him? Why, how you talk! Of course I don’t.”

“Then how’ll you do it?”

“It’s very simple and very easy. Guess. How would you do it, Jimmy?”

“Send him a letter. I never thought of it till this minute. But I’ll bet that’s your way.”

“I’ll bet it ain’t. Tell me, how would you send it?”

“Why, through the mail, of course.”

Tommy overwhelmed him with scoffings, and said:

“Now, don’t you suppose every crank in the empire is doing the same thing? Do you mean to say you haven’t thought of that?”

“Well—no,” said Jimmy, abashed.

“You might have thought of it, if you weren’t so young and inexperienced. Why, Jimmy, when even a common general, or a poet, or an actor, or any-body that’s a little famous gets sick, all the cranks in the kingdom load up the mails with certain-sure quack cures for him. And so, what’s bound to happen when it’s the Emperor?”

“I suppose it’s worse,” said Jimmy, sheepishly.

“Well, I should think so! Look here, Jimmy: every single night we cart off as many as six loads of that kind of letters from the back yard of the palace, where they’re thrown. Eighty thousand letters in one night! Do you reckon anybody reads them? Sho! not a single one. It’s what would happen to your letter if you wrote it—which you won’t, I reckon?”

“No,” sighed Jimmy, crushed.

“But it’s all right, Jimmy. Don’t you fret: there’s more than one way to skin a cat. I’ll get the word to him.”

“Oh, if you only could, Tommy, I should love you forever!”

“I’ll do it, I tell you. Don’t you worry; you depend on me.”

“Indeed I will, Tommy, for you do know so much. You’re not like other boys: they never know anything. How’ll you manage, Tommy?”

Tommy was greatly pleased. He settled himself for reposeful talk, and said:

“Do you know that ragged poor thing that thinks he’s a butcher because he goes around with a basket and sells cat’s meat and rotten livers? Well, to begin with, I’ll tell him.”

Jimmy was deeply disappointed and chagrined, and said:

“Now, Tommy, it’s a shame to talk so. You know my heart’s in it, and it’s not right.”

Tommy gave him a love-pat, and said:

“Don’t you be troubled, Jimmy. I know what I’m about. Pretty soon you’ll see. That half-breed butcher will tell the old woman that sells chestnuts at the corner of the lane—she’s his closest friend, and I’ll ask him to; then, by request, she’ll tell her rich aunt that keeps the little fruit-shop on the corner two blocks