A sorrowing mother, bereft of her infant, visits a foundling asylum and adopts a baby girl. The young widow lavishes her love and care on the adopted infant and her environment is the finest. The story is allegorical in theme. Father Time presents the baby with an hour glass containing '"The Sands of Time." which are all in the upper part of the glass. The story of her subsequent life shows how heredity overbalances environment. The girl grows wayward in spite of all the efforts of her devoted parent. With rare tact and patience the lonely mother again and again unsuccessfully attempts to direct the girl's destinies to a noble womanhood. Finally heredity asserts itself; the child breaks away, and in a distant city lives a life of her own choosing. Here she travels the primrose path till the very end. At stated intervals during her life, Father Time appears to her and shows the hourglass with the sands half run. But she will not heed nor change her life. Now in middle age, beauty and its bloom desert her, and on the immediate horizon she sees the sordidness of an unlovely old age. Finally the last vestige of youth departs, old age overtakes her, and in the public almshouse she makes her last stand against the "dreaded visitor with his hourglass." Here she drinks deep of the dregs of humiliation and shame. She finally weakens and is induced by a clergyman to accept religion as a solace for her misspent life. Father Time again appears and the "Sands of Time" are now full run, but she is ready and smiling, happy at last.