The Black Sheep

You would think that the death of his wife through his dissipation and neglect would have brought Jack Moreland to his senses. Instead he is more dissipated, and deserts his child, Clara, who is taken by her uncle, Harold Moreland, and brought up in ignorance of her father's existence. Harold, being a man of means, gives her every advantage, and she becomes a very talented and accomplished young lady. She is engaged to Percival Summers. After an obscurity of seventeen years, Jack Moreland makes himself known to his daughter. She is horrified to learn that he is her father and naturally shuns him. Percival Summers, shocked at the prospect of having such a father-in-law, breaks his engagement with her. Edward, Percival's brother, has always been in love with Clara, and when his brother gives her up, he declares his love for her, and being a manly and good-hearted fellow, persuades Clara to trace her father's whereabouts and help him, if possible to make a man of himself. Her father, waking up to a realization of his own wickedness, hungers for the love of his daughter, and is only too willing, when she visits him, to reform. With the assistance of Edward, they place her father in a good position and it is not long before he regains himself and becomes a creditable parent and a desirable citizen,