"Ay, ay--that's all right, mother, and you shall do with me just what you please in any of them matters; but as for not being Moses Marble, you might as well ask me not to be myself. I should be another man, to change my name. A fellow might as well go without clothes, as go without a name; and mine came so hard, I don't like to part with it. No, no--had it come to pass, now, that my parents had been a king and a queen, and that I was to succeed 'em on the throne, I should reign as King Moses Marble, or not reign at all."
"You'll think better of this, and take out a new register under your lawful designation."
"I'll tell you what I'll do, mother, and that will satisfy all parties. I'll bend on the old name to the new one, and sail under both."
"I care not how you are called, my son, so long as no one has need to blush for the name you bear. This gentleman tells me you are an honest and true-hearted man; and those are blessings for which I shall never cease to thank God."
"Miles has been singing my praises, has he! I can tell you, mother, you had need look out for Miles's tongue Natur' intended him for a lawyer, and it's mere accident his being a sailor, though a capital one he is. But what may be my name, according to law?"
"Oloff Van Duser Wetmore Moses Marble, according to your own expedient of sailing under all your titles. You can ring the changes, however, and call yourself Moses Oloff Marble Van Duser Wetmore, if you like that better."
Moses laughed, and as I saw that both he and his new-found mother were in a fit state to be left together, and that the sun now wanted but an hour or two of setting, I rose to take my leave.
"You will remain with your mother to-night, Marble," I observed. "I will keep the sloop at an anchor until I can see you in the morning, when we will settle the future a little more deliberately."
"I should not like to lose my son so soon after finding him," the old woman anxiously remarked.
"No fear of me, mother--I berth under your roof to-night, and so many more in the bargain, that you'll be glad enough to be rid of me in the end."