“I see,” said Uncle Ike, smoking right along. “You are like a man who owns the most beautiful diamond in the world, and is not allowed for some reason to be known as its owner, but is allowed to wear it only two hours a week, and then other people are allowed to wear it. You know it is yours, and yet when it is in the possession of others, you don't dare go and claim it, and they wear it as though they own it, and people see it in their possession and admire it, as it sparkles and throws rays of sunshine, and think how lucky is the man who wears it. Isn't that about your idea? She is yours, body and soul, but has not been delivered to you, eh?” “Sure! That's it, exactly. What shall I do, Uncle Ike?” “Shut up!” said the old man; “that is what you want to do. Brace up; you have no cause to worry. I can tell by that face of hers. When she is going with other boys, as she must, she is thinking of you all the time, and wishing your red head was in place of that of the kid who is buying ice-cream soda for her. When she walks about the streets she is thinking of when you were with her at the same place. And when you are permitted to pass an hour with her she will convince you in a minute that you are all the world to her, and that the other ducks are not in it. I can tell by her eyes, boy, and her mouth, and her whole face, that she is a thoroughbred.” “Well, I swan, Uncle Ike, you are better than a doctor,” and the red-headed boy began to hug the old man, and dance around, and kick high, and he took the picture and looked at it, and said: “Nobody but a chump would doubt that girl,” and the boy suddenly became himself again, reassured as to the position he held in the mind of his girl, by a few words of kindly advice at the right time, when the boy was on the verge of suicide. He laughed and pinched himself to be sure he was awake, and then took on a serious look and said: “Uncle Ike, do you think it will take two hundred years, honestly, to subjugate the Filipinos, and tame them, so that they will eat out of our hands?”