But if you like to hear what happened to me once, I have no objection to tell you.
"I often think how little we know what's going to happen to us any minute of our lives.

To-day we have the breeze fair in our favor, we are going seven knots, studding-sails set, smooth water, and plenty of sea-room; to-morrow the wind freshens to half a gale, the sea gets up, a rocky coast is seen from the lee bow, and may be--to add to all--we spring a leak forward; but then, after all, bad as it looks, mayhap, we rub through even this, and with the next day, the prospect is as bright and cheering as ever.

You'll perhaps ask me what has all this moralizing to do with women and ships at sea?
Nothing at all with them, except that I was a going to say, that when matters look worst, very often the best is in store for us, and we should never say strike when there is a timber together.

Now for my story:-- "It's about four years ago, I was strolling one evening down the side of the harbor at Cove, with my hands in my pocket, having nothing to do, nor no prospect of it, for my last ship had been wrecked off the Bermudas, and nearly all the crew lost; and somehow, when a man is in misfortune, the underwriters won't have him at no price.

Well, there I was, looking about me at the craft that lay on every side waiting for a fair wind to run down channel.