great gold jingling anklets fringing his little fat feet, he looked very
royal indeed. Very royal and large and calm, for he was a grave baby
with big, dark, piercing eyes and a decided chin.

"He is as like his grandfather as two splits of a pea!" cried Head-nurse
in rapture, and then she went to the tent door and shrilled out:

"Slaves! Quick! Come and perform your lowly salute on the occasion of
the cutting of a back tooth belonging to the Heir-to-Empire, the
Most----"

She cut short her string of titles, for a crash of thunder overhead
warned her she had best be speedy before the rain soaked through the
worn tent.

"Quick, slaves!" she added; "keep us not waiting all day. Enter and
prostrate yourselves on the ground with due reverence! Quick! Quick!"

She need not have been in such a hurry, for it did not take long for the
"slaves," as she called them, to perform their lowly salaam by touching
the very ground with their foreheads. There were but three of them--Old
Faithful, the trooper; Roy, the Râjput boy; and Meroo, the scullion; the
rest were away with their master, King Humâyon.

Old Faithful, however, tall, lank, grey-bearded, brought enough devotion
for half a dozen followers. He had served with little Akbar's
grandfather, Babar the brave, and when he saw the child standing so fair
and square, he gave almost a sharp cry of remembrance and delight. And
when he stood up after his prostration, in soldier fashion he held out
the hilt of his old sword for the baby to touch in token that its