AN EXTRAORDINARY ELOPEMENT.

Patea Mail, Volume II, Issue 133, 19 July 1876, Page 3

AN EXTRAORDINARY ELOPEMENT.

The Liverpool Mercury ■ of- Mni'ch 4th says:—“ The denouement ol : ah extraordinary elopi'inent case took place on board the Allan steamer Moravian on -Thursday last. In the afternoon the steamer was leaving the Mersey with a fail complement of passengers for Portland. Just as she got under way a river gig was seen approaching in all haste. In the bow of the boat was seen an aged man, who gesticulated frantically to those on board the steamer to stop. The. boat got alongside the steamer, and in a short time two of its occupants—a man about sixty years of age and a young man of twenty-two—-clambered on board the Moravian.

The officers were naturally surprised at seeing the steamer boarded in this fashion ; but, noticing that the old man was in trouble, they received him courteously and listened to his tale, which was to the effect that his wife—a woman of forty eight and the mother of grown up children—had eloped with a young man of twenty-two ; that they were on board the Moravian on route for America ; and the deserted husband and bis son demanded that the captain should send the runaways on shore. While the captain was explaining that the law gave him no such power the runaway wife happened to pass along the deck near where the group were discussing-the point. She recognised her husband. A fit of repentance seized hof. She at once forgot her new love, and now only thought of the old. Exclaiming, “ Oh, John, are you here ?” she embraced her husband and kissed him. Her son, too, she saluted in a most affectionate way. But while these preliminaries to a reconciliation were going on, the faithless wife’s companion made his appearance on the scene, and placidly asked what “ it was all about.” The deserted husband implored his fickle spouse to return to her homo in Wednesbury. This she consented to do but made it a sine quanon that the companion of her flight should be allowed to return with her. The husband accepted the terms thus dictated. The master of the Moravian, seeing that arrangements had been come to, facilitated the return to the shore of the troublesome party who had for a time disturbed the decorum observed on board his steamer. When the party arrived at the stage they wore jeered by a crowd who had heard of the strange elopement and wonderful reconciliation. Wife and husband walked arm in arm lovingly along the stage, and the “ lover,” as if to make an atonement for his wrong doing, walked meekly behind carrying the luggage.