r only friend now
is that dog that keeps so close to her."

"Let her be comforted," the convict cried, approaching her; "if her
sorrow is ever so deep, it can be healed."

He closed his book as he spoke and approached his child, who sat with
downcast eyes, and apparently unconscious of his presence.

"Daughter," he began; but at the sound of his voice so near, she raised
her eyes hastily, and on her face could be seen the emotions and
struggles to recollect where she had before heard his tones. She
pressed her hand to her forehead as though forcing memory to reveal its
secret, but suddenly the truth was revealed to her.

"Father," she cried, starting to her feet, and throwing her arms around
that white-headed man's neck, venerable before his time. "Father! O God,
is it you?"

She laid her aching head upon his bosom, and, with her arms around his
neck, shed tears as freely as she did the day that she was separated
from him, as she thought, forever.

The convict staggered back, and would have fallen, had not Fred's strong
arm supported him. He glanced from face to face as though trying to read
the meaning of the surprise, and then he turned his looks upon his
daughter.

"Mary," he cried, after pushing the hair from her forehead, "can it,
indeed, be my child--has the little girl whom I left in England grown to
be a woman!"

He held her close in his embrace as though he feared that something
would happen to prevent his seeing her again. He kissed the tears from
her cheeks, and begged her to be calm, and to tell him about her voyage,
and lastly to speak about her husband and children.

Her sobs were her only response. He grew impatient at her refusal to
answer his interrogations, and then suspicions of foul play entered his
imagination.

"There has been some wrong done you," he cried, appealing to his
daughter.

She answered with tears and moans.

"Speak, and tell me who has dared to injure you," he cried vehemently.
"Was it your husband?"

His brow grew threatening and black, as he put the question.

There was no reply, but his daughter clung to his neck with a more
convulsive grasp, as though she feared to lose her parent also.

He glanced from Smith to Fred, and from the latter to myself, as though
debating whether we were the guilty party.

"Tell me," he cried, lifting her head from his shoulder, and seeking to
get a glimpse of her face, "who has wronged you?"

There was no response. He placed her