I Forbid the Banns! — page 218: what you’re looking at

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

CHAPTER XXXI. ON A BISHOP. aig next day Bertha was made aware of what an Eng- lish May could do in the way of rain. So far from feeling inclined to grumble, however, her Australian mem- ories caused her to rejoice at the steady downpour that blotted out from view even the nearest trees of the park. The squatter’s daughter looked on rain as the best of nature’s gifts—only one that was not bestowed with suf- ficient frequency. She had not yet spent a summer in England. She clothed herself in waterproofs and made an excur- sion on foot with Julian to the home farm, winning the admiration of the farmer’s wife by her intelligent obser- vations on the subject of lambs. Where this handsome young lady had picked up her knowledge of the treat- ment of stock the good woman could not imagine. She had no hesitation in assuring her husband, however, that Mrs. Charlton was one of the right sort, even though she did not belong to any of the leading families of Brack- enshire. It was an open question in the good woman’s mind if the percentage of Brackenshire ladies who would face a downpour of rain for the sake of accompanying their husbands to a farm was large. Bertha’s trudge home through the muddy lanes she felt to be altogether delightful. The English farm was a new experience to her, and she confessed that it was infinitely more picturesque than any Australian station she had ever known. The farmhouse looked, she said, as if it had taken root in the soil, and the furniture had not the 208 EOMMICLYOOlKS. (EC)