through the doorway, six husbands at least would start and say,
"Coming, dear!" I computed the Pauls belonging to one of the grand
nations, and proved that an army recruited from them would be large
enough to carry on a war against a power of the second order.

"If the Jameses were to reinforce the Pauls," I declared, looking
toward my young host, "Russia itself would tremble.--Are you to make
your start in life with no better name?" I asked him maliciously.
"Must you be for ever kept in mediocrity by an address that is not
the designation of an individual, but of a whole nation? Could you not
have been called by something rather less oecumenical?"

"You may style me by what title you please, Mr. Flemming," said
Grandstone nonchalantly. "I am to enter a great New York wine-house
after a little examination of the grape-country here. Doubtless a
Grandstone will have, by any other name, a bouquet as sweet."

The idea took. An almanac of saints' days, which is often printed in
combination with the _menu_ of a restaurant, was lying on the table.
Beginning at the letter A, the name of Ambrose was within an ace of
being chosen, but Grandstone protested against it as too short,
and Athanasius was the first of five syllables that presented. Our
engineering friend, who was present, had in his pocket a vial of
water from the Dardanelles, which fouls ships' bottoms; and with that
classic liquid the baptism was effected by myself, the bottle being
broken on poor Grandstone's crown as on the prow of a ship.

"You are no longer James to us, but Athanasius," I said. "If you
remain moderately virtuous, we will canonize you. Meantime, let us
vow to meet on the next canonical day of Saint Athanasius and hold a