I Forbid the Banns! — page 56: what you’re looking at

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

46 ° «7 FORBID THE BANNS!” “ How interesting! I can easily fancy the vision that _came before your eyes.” She was speaking seriously. He could perceive that she was really interested in what he had told her regarding the meeting of his father and mother. “Yes,’’ she continued after a little pause which he did not think necessary to break. ‘“ Yes, you stood there at the brink of the cliff, and you saw coming toward you a beautiful girl—her face flushed with the exertion of climb- ing, and her fair hair flying about her shapely head, as the breeze from the ocean ran the tender fingers of a mother through those loose tresses.”’ “ Good God!” cried Charlton, starting from the bul- warks against which he had been leaning, and staring at Marian Travers. He recovered himself in an instant, and gave a laugh. He wondered if the amiable Sir Ebenezer added a little astronomy to his other blameless accomplish- ments—if he possessed a trustworthy telescope, by the aid of which the summit of Ladder Hill might be made visible from Government House. He had heard of the imagina- tion of young women being stimulated by the aid of applied science. ‘Pray go on, Miss Travers,” he said. ‘ Pray tell me all that I saw at the summit of the hill. I should like to be provided with a complete list.” “If you did not see all that I have told you of, you must have a singularly weak imagination,” said Miss Travers. “JT cannot understand why young men who chance to be Englishmen should be ashamed to acknowledge that they have brains or imagination.” ‘“‘T cannot understand it any more than yourself, Miss Travers ; but whether we understand it or not, they are,” said Charlton. ‘““ Now, do you mean to tell me that you went up to that place, where your father and your mother met in so roman- (CONNIE OOKS co