Briefly Mr. Laurance outlined the facts of his escape upon a raft, which was hastily constructed by several of the crew when the boats were beyond their reach.  Upon this he had placed Maud, and on the morning after the wreck of the vessel they succeeded in getting into one of the boats which was floating bottom upward, and providentially drifted quite near the raft.  For several days they were tossed helplessly from wave to wave, exposed to heavy rains, and on the third evening, poor little Maud who had been unconscious for some hours, died in her father’s arms.  At midnight when the moon shone full and bright, he had wrapped the little form in his coat, and consigned her to a final resting-place beneath the blue billows, where her mother had already gone down amid the fury of the gale.  He knew from the colour and lettering of the boat, that it was the same in which he had placed his terrified wife, and when it floated to their raft he could not doubt her melancholy fate.  A few hours after Maud’s burial, a Danish brig bound for Valparaiso discovered the boat and its signals of distress, and taking on board the four survivors, sailed away on its destined track.  Mr. Laurance bad made his way to Rio Janeiro, and subsequently to Havana, but learning from the published accounts that his wife had indeed perished, and that he also was numbered among the lost, he determined not to reveal the fact of his existence to any one.  Financially beggared, his ancestral home covered by mortgages which Mrs. Laurance held, and utterly hopeless of arousing her compassion or obtaining her pardon, he was too proud to endure the humiliation that would overwhelm him in the divorce suit he knew she intended to institute; and resolved never to return to the United States, where he could expect only disgrace and sorrow.

While in Liverpool, preparing to go to Melbourne, he accidentally found and read Mrs. Laurance’s advertisement in the London Times, offering a reward for any definite information concerning Cuthbert Laurance, reported lost on Steamer ——.  Had she relented, would she pardon him now?  He was lonely, desolate; his heart yearned for the sight of his fair young daughter, doubly dear since the loss of poor Maud, and he longed inexpressibly to see once more the love of his early and his later life.

If still implacably vindictive, would she have continued the advertisement, which so powerfully tempted him to reveal himself?  He was fully conscious of his own unworthiness, and of the magnitude of the wrongs inflicted upon her, but after a long struggle with his pride, which bled sorely at thought of the scornful repulse that might await him, he had written confidentially to Mr. Palma, and in accordance with his advice, returned to New York.

Only the day previous he had arrived, and now came to test the power of memory over his wife’s heart.

“Father, she is sitting alone on the verandah, with such a world of sadness in her eyes, which have lost the blessed power of weeping.  Go to her.  I believe you need no ally to reach my mother’s heart.”