se, when he comes along. He doesn't like the names of
our destroyers. In his navy there was significance in the names they
gave to a class of ships.

"Take _Viper_, _Adder_, _Moccasin_, and so on--they suggest things y'
know. Dangerous to meddle with and all that sort of thing, y' know. But
your people name your ships after men evidently--_David Jones_,
_Conyngham_, _McDonough_. I say, who are they--Presidents or senators or
that sort, or what?"

Lanahan was there--the hell-with-her-ram-her-anyway Lanahan--and we all
just naturally turned him over to Lanahan, who had west-of-Ireland
forebears, and never did believe in letting any Englishman put anything
across--nothing like that anyway.

"You never read much, I take it, of our history?" says Lanahan.

"Your history? My dear chap, I had hard work keeping up with my own."

"No doubt. But you've heard of the American Revolution?"

"I dessay I have--Oh, yes, I have!"

"Well, you spoke of Jones. If you mean John Paul, then there was a naval
fight one time in the North Sea--the _Serapis_ and the _Bonhomme
Richard_."

"I say, old chap, I didn't mention John Paul Jones. _David Jones_ is the
name of your destroyer out in the harbor now."

"David Jones? Let me see. Why, sure, David Jones was a New England
parson who boarded around among the God-fearing neighbors for his keep
on week-days and preached the wrath of God and hell-fire for his cash
wage--five pound a year--on Sundays. He was a devout man. If thy finger
offend thee, cut it off. But a sort of muscular Christian, too. If thy
enemy cross thee, go out and whale the livers and lights out of
him--same as we're trying to do to the U-boats now.

"Well David lived in the shadow of the church till he was thirty-seven
years of age. Then the Revolution broke, and David, in whose veins
flowed the blood of old Covenanters, took a running long jump into it.
He started in as deck-hand or, perhaps, it was cook's helper, but there
was salt in his veins too, and rapidly he learned his trade. And soon
rose in his new profession until he was master of his own ship, and, as
master, raising the devil among the coasters which used to cruise out of
Maritime Province ports in those days. The captures he made of vessels
loaded with hay and potatoes, and so on, materially reduced the high
cost of living for New England folks in those days.

"Conyngham? He was a young American lad who did not come of any
particularly good old stock, m