AN AMERICAN ROMANCE

Wellington Independent, Volume XXVIII, Issue 3803, 13 May 1873, Page 3

AN AMERICAN ROMANCE

The New York papers contain the following romantic story : — Captain Charles Vincent sailed from Boston for Calcutta in August, 1843. He left in i a quiet town near Bangor, Maine, a young girl of eighteen, to whom he was betrothed. Captain Vincent was but twenty five when his ship, Laura Sheldon, stood out to sea. Nearly a year elapsed, and no tidings of either ship, officers, or crew had been received at home. Years came and went, and hundreds of East ludiamen sailed into American harbors, but never a word regarding the ship Laura Sheldon was received. In the meantime the young girl, faithful to the memory of her sailor lover, remained unmarried, refusing many advantageous offers from suitors her equals in social position and intellectual culture, for she is a lady of superior mind. Through all these twenty-nine years of silence she has been hopeful, and iudeed cheerful ; she has never despaired of the return of her lover. On the 15th of September last, a letter was received by her aged mother, post-marked " Liverpool." The writer was Capiain Charles Vincent, now a man of fifty-four years. He asked her to inform him if her daughter was still alive and unmarried, and said if (he reply should be to that effect that he should sail at once for America. The mother immediately anssvcred his letter, carefully concealing everything from her daughter. On the first day of this month Captain Vincent alighted at the door of his betrothed. Captain Vincent's story would fill a volume. The Laura Sheldon was shipwrecked in the Indian Ocean, and only the captain and one sailor survived. They were rescued from their perilous position on a raft after two days by a brig bound to China. In one of the Chinese seaports Captain Vinceut lived for years, a clerk in an English trading house. He wrote several letters home, but received no answer. He gradually became prosperous in business, and will return to China in a few months with his bride.