“Zebedee Wyvil was a bachelor; and he was the main support of his sister-in-law, the widow of his younger brother, Andrew, and of her two children, Joseph and Elizabeth, who lived at Stockton, a small village in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
“Zebedee Wyvil, when on shore, always made his home with this sister-in-law.
“Now, on leaving his ship, he resolved to take the Spanish child with him to Stockton, and place him under the care of this sister-in-law.
“But first he bethought him of having the boy christened, lest that necessary ceremony had not already been performed.
“So he took the lad to St. John’s Church in Glasgow and had him christened Joseph Wyvil, in honor of his—Zebedee’s—own father.
“Then he carried the child to his own home and presented him to his sister-in-law.
“The widow and her children received the sailor and the orphan boy with great kindness; but when his name was given—
“‘Joseph Wyvil!’ exclaimed the widow. ‘Why, what in the name of sense put you on giving the bairn that name?’
“‘It was the name of my old feyther, as good a man as ever lived,’ retorted Zebedee.
“‘But it is the name of my own lad!’