Saint Croix Union

ROMANCE OF LIFE.-We heard the particulars yesterday of one of those strange episodes in life by which the old adage of "truth is stranger than fiction" was fully illustrated. About six years since, a lady named Mrs. Martha Wood, accompanied with her son, his wife, and a couple of children, arrived in this city from New Bedford, Mass. She stated that she was a widow of some twenty four years' standing, her husband having been mate of a whaler which had been lost at sea. The family have resided for the greater portion of the time on Liberty street, Mr. Wood, the son, working at his trade, which is that of a cooper.

Yesterday morning a grey headed and toil worn man called at the residence of the family, and, seeing Mr. Wood, inquired for the widow, who, being called into the room, while gazing intently at the stranger, whose eyes were mournfully fixed upon her, and requested to know his business.

"Do you not know me, Martha?" said he, and as the sound of his voice, like the memory of an olden melody met her ear, she gave vent to a hysterical cry, and fainted in the arms which were opened to receive her,

The tale is soon told; the ship in which he had made his last voyage, from New Bedford was cast away in the South Sea Islands, and he was one of the few who escaped a watery grave. After enduring almost unheard of privations, he succeeded, after thirty years' absence, in reaching his native city. From a brother of his wife he learned their present location, and arrived here to find her whom he had left a young and blooming bride an advanced in the evening of life, while the infant, upon whose lips, when last he saw him, he had imprinted a father's kiss, and who could then scarcely lisp his name, was now a stalwart man and the head of a family. How many hopes and fears must have agitated the heart of the old mariner as he again set foot, after his long pilgrimage, upon his native soil.-Cin. Enquirer.