I Forbid the Banns! — page 155: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CHAPTER XXII. ON THE ART OF SINGING. HE house in Chelsea to which Julian Charlton was driven on the next evening was a modest one, not far from the hospital. On the iron gate giving one access to a garden, twenty feet by fifteen, there was a brass plate bearing the inscription : THE CARNISOLIST SocIETY, Matthew Hardy, Secretary. This scarcely looked like the house which a young woman having an income of between ten and twelve thousand pounds a year would be likely to choose as a permanent residence in London. If these were the headquarters of the carnisolists he should judge that the society had not yet reached a position that commanded the attention of the opulent. As he knocked he reflected upon the possibility of the finanees of the society being suddenly placed on a more satisfactory basis through the incident of the secretary’s niece coming to reside at the headquarters of the carni- solists. But this conjecture and every other one was sent to the winds when he became aware of the fact that a ‘duet was being sung within the house—a duet for a very unmanage- able bass and a very sympathetic soprano. He had never heard Bertha sing, but he knew in an instant that the soprano was hers. He had never heard Vicars sing, but he had a settled conviction that the unruly bass was his. 145 Gomichooks (E(@)