that's me. This camping out in New York is getting to be a habit. I'm
sending you a bundle of newspaper clippings as big as a stovepipe--all
about Yours Truly.

As soon as I saw that circumstances had organized a pool to corner me
and my Christmases, I spent a couple of days sending up rain-making
language. Then I settled down to work like a bronco does to harness
after kicking off the dashboard and snapping a couple of traces.

"If I've got to be alone this Christmas," I says to myself, "I'll make
it the gol-blamedest, crowdedest solitude ever heard of this side of
the River."

I looked for the biggest place in town under one roof. Madison
Square Garden was _it_. You remember it. We was there to the Horse
Show--so-called. You recollect, I reckon, that the Garden holds right
smart of people. At a political meeting once they got 14,000 people into
it, and there was still room for Grover Cleveland to stand and make
a speech.

Well, feeling kind o' flush and recklesslike, I decided to go and see
the manager, or janitor, or whatever he is. And go I did. I says to him:
"Could I rent your cute little shack for one evening--Christmas night?"

"Certainly, sir," he says. "There happens to be nothing doing this
Christmas."

"How much would it set me back?" I says very polite.

"Only one thousand plunks," says he smiling.

"But, my dear Gaston," I says with a low bow, "I don't want to buy your
little Noah's Ark for the baby. I only want to borrow it for one evening."

"One thou. is our bargain-counter limit," he says. "I couldn't make it
less for the poor old Czar of Rooshy."

I kind o' hesitated, remembering the time when a thousand dollars would
have kept me comfortable for about three years. It's hard to get over
the habit of counting your change. Then Mr. Janitor, seeing me kind o'
groggy, says, a little less polite:

"If that's more than you care to pay for a single room you can get a cot
for five cents on the Bowery; for a quarter you can get a whole suite."

[Illustration: "ONLY ONE THOUSAND PLUNKS," SAYS HE]

That riled me. I flashed a wad of bills on him that made his eyes look
like two automobile lamps. He could see it wasn't Confederate money,
either. Then I shifted my cigar to detract attention while I swallowed
my Adam's apple, and I says:

"I was only hesitating, my boy, because I wondered if your nice young
Garden would be big enough. You haven't got a couple more to rent at the
same price?"

He