"Thirty years ago come Thanksgiving," said Ben, in a voice pitched below his usual key, "the _Isidore_ lay at the wharf with her topsails loose, waiting for a slant of wind to put to sea. She was named for the builder's daughter, a mighty pretty gal, sir; but the boys didn't like the name because it sounded outlandish-like, and would have rather had an out-an'-out Yankee one any day of the week." "There is, then," I suggested, "something in a name at sea as well as ashore?" "Lor' bless your dear soul, I've seen them barkeys as could almost ship a crew for nothing, they had such spanking, saucy names. Captain R---- was as good a sailor as ever stepped, but dretful profane. He was as brave as a lion, and had rescued the crew of an Englishman from certain death while drifting a helpless wreck before a gale. No boat could live in the sea that was running; but Captain R---- bore down for the sinking ship, and passed it so close that the crew saved themselves by jumping aboard of him. Seven or eight times he stood for that wreck, until all but one man were saved. He had the ill-luck afterward to get a cotton ship ashore at Three Acres, near where the _Isidore_ was lost, and said, as I've heard, 'he hoped the next vessel that went ashore he should be under her keel.' He had his wish, most likely. "The _Isidore_ was light, just on top of water, and never ought to have gone to sea in that plight; but she had been a good while wind-bound, and all hands began to be impatient to be off. Her crew, fifteen as likely lads as ever reefed a topsail, all belonged in the neighborhood. One of 'em didn't feel noways right about the v'y'ge, and couldn't make up his mind to go until the ship was over the bar, when he had to be set aboard in a wherry. Another dreamed three nights running the same dream, and every blessed time he saw the _Isidore_ strike on a lee shore with the sea a-flying as high as the maintop. Every time he woke up in a cold sweat, with the cries of his shipmates ringing in his ears as plain as we hear the rote on Gooch's Beach this minute. So, when the _Isidore_ set her colors and dropped down the river, Joe, though he had signed the articles and got the advance, took to the woods. Most every body thought it scandalous for the ship to unmoor, but Captain R---- said he would go to sea if he went to h--l the next minute. Dretful profane man, sir--dretful.