“I know not if I am or not, sir.  The good priest that is called Father Andrew taught me, of his kindness, from his books.”

“Know’st thou the Latin?”

“But scantly, sir, I doubt.”

“Learn it, lad:  ’tis hard only at first.  The Greek is harder; but neither these nor any tongues else, I think, are hard to the Lady Elizabeth and my cousin.  Thou should’st hear those damsels at it!  But tell me of thy Offal Court.  Hast thou a pleasant life there?”

“In truth, yes, so please you, sir, save when one is hungry.  There be Punch-and-Judy shows, and monkeys—­oh such antic creatures! and so bravely dressed!—­and there be plays wherein they that play do shout and fight till all are slain, and ’tis so fine to see, and costeth but a farthing—­albeit ’tis main hard to get the farthing, please your worship.”

“Tell me more.”

“We lads of Offal Court do strive against each other with the cudgel, like to the fashion of the ’prentices, sometimes.”

The prince’s eyes flashed.  Said he—­

“Marry, that would not I mislike.  Tell me more.”

“We strive in races, sir, to see who of us shall be fleetest.”

“That would I like also.  Speak on.”

“In summer, sir, we wade and swim in the canals and in the river, and each doth duck his neighbour, and splatter him with water, and dive and shout and tumble and—­”

“’Twould be worth my father’s kingdom but to enjoy it once!  Prithee go on.”

“We dance and sing about the Maypole in Cheapside; we play in the sand, each covering his neighbour up; and times we make mud pastry—­oh the lovely mud, it hath not its like for delightfulness in all the world!—­we do fairly wallow in the mud, sir, saving your worship’s presence.”

“Oh, prithee, say no more, ’tis glorious!  If that I could but clothe me in raiment like to thine, and strip my feet, and revel in the mud once, just once, with none to rebuke me or forbid, meseemeth I could forego the crown!”

“And if that I could clothe me once, sweet sir, as thou art clad—­just once—­”

“Oho, would’st like it?  Then so shall it be.  Doff thy rags, and don these splendours, lad!  It is a brief happiness, but will be not less keen for that.  We will have it while we may, and change again before any come to molest.”

A few minutes later the little Prince of Wales was garlanded with Tom’s fluttering odds and ends, and the little Prince of Pauperdom was tricked out in the gaudy plumage of royalty.  The two went and stood side by side before a great mirror, and lo, a miracle:  there did not seem to have been any change made!  They stared at each other, then at the glass, then at each other again.  At last the puzzled princeling said—­

“What dost thou make of this?”

“Ah, good your worship, require me not to answer.  It is not meet that one of my degree should utter the thing.”