and precipitate engagement, and to annul it by the authority of Scripture itself."
"Scripture!" said Ravenswood, scornfully.
"Let him hear the text," said Lady Ashton, appealing to the divine, "on which you yourself, with cautious reluctance, declared the nullity of the pretended engagement insisted upon by this violent man."
The clergyman took his clasped Bible from his pocket, and read the following words: "If a woman vow a vow unto the Lord, and bind herself by a bond, being in her father's house in her youth, and her father hear her vow and her bond, wherewith she hath bound her soul, and her father shall hold his peace at her, then all her vow shall stand."
"And was it not even so with us?" interrupted Ravenswood.
"Controul thy impatience, young man," answered the divine, "and hear what follows in the sacred text:—'But if her father disallow her in the day that he heareth,
