The sacrifice Captain Tom made for the sake .of the girl’s happiness was the greatest a man can make for the woman he loves. Love that passeth all understanding was that which filled the old sailor’s heart with fragrance and with sorrow. For years he had felt his affection for sweet Nell Connors pulsing within him, yet he seldom allowed an expression of it to escape him. The whole village knew he loved her, but few understood how much. Such love as his, so strong, so potent, is rare enough to be beyond almost anyone’s ken. She did not care for Tom, but she did love happy Jack Careless, the sailor to whom she plighted her troth just before he sailed away on a long voyage to the Indies. He was to have written often, but, alas, no letter came at all and her simple soul sank beneath a weight of woe. She knew nothing of Jack’s shipwreck and the trials that beset him and meanwhile an event of great portent to her life occurred at home. Her father was saved from a watery grave by Captain Tom’s strong arms and when Tom bashfully asked her to share his lot, believing that Jack had forgotten his love for her, her father’s voice was raised to give strength to the entreaty. She hesitated, but the pressure was too much and at last she responded in the affirmative. The wedding day was set, the bells rang out, the bridal party started for the church when suddenly a shadow fell athwart Captain Tom’s happiness. Jack, just returned, burst upon the scene. Captain Tom loved her too well to compel her promise to him. Jack took his place at the altar after the old sailor had made his renunciation for her sake. Oblivious of all else but their own happiness Nell and Jack sailed away on their honeymoon, old Captain Tom was blotted out of their lives, but he cherished his dead love in his bosom and felt the girl’s happiness was compensation for what he had lost.