The Illegal Marriage — page 54: what you’re looking at

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

46 THE ILLEGAL MAKRIAGE. “They may say thing's that will be hard for you to hear; but, my darling, whatever I may have done in the past, I shall redeem in the present. A life- time of devotion could not cancel the debt that I have in your love.” “Don’t say that; pray don’t talk to me so. It frizhtens me.” “T must tell you, Cecy. I must tell you now, and let my actions speak hereafter. I have been a little wild, perhaps, but malicious tongues have maligned my errors. From this time my better life begins.” Honest words they were, and as he spoke them the young man believed in them truly. He had been trained according to the strict religious code of the Puritans, and when away from home had gone into excesses from the novelty of the tempta- tions that surrounded him. “My boyish life was hard, harsh—it was cruel,” he once said to a pious man who endeavored to re- monstrate with him for his sins. “I had no youth— literally, no youth, and I am going to take it now.” He thought of this as he sat there beside the woman who had pledged her life to him; he thought of all his errors, his petty meanness, that had been almost a necessity to him; and he thought of his crime. A deathly paleness came over his face as he recalled this word, and he started as if stung by a serpent. His mind flew with lightning rapidity over that past, and he felt relieved as he thought that nearly all traces of this act must now be lost, and that he could begin a better life. He spoke honestly therefore when he uttered these words to the woman he loved. Again he rose to go, (ele) Eomicbooks