Waverley Library (Quarto Edition) (no. 62) (1881 01 18)

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YRUTTY al h 4 7 r i ‘| ‘ell i ‘mi mn a Copyrighted in 1881 by BEADLE AND ADAMS, January 18, 1881. PRICE, 5 CENTS. “THIS IS OUR BRIDAL CHAMBER, BERENICE, ENTER, AND LAY THY HEAD UPON MY BREAST, AND OUR SLUMBERS SHALL BE SWEET. COME, MY BRIDE; I HAVE WAITED FOR THEE LONG. The Maniac Bride; or, The Dead Secret of Hollow Ash Hall BY MARGARET BLOUNT. CHAPTER I. It was a wild, raw, November afternoon. . The sky was dark and low- ering; the wind swept down from the hills with a mournful, wailing sound, and beneath the tall trees that bent before the gale, lay heaps of faded yellow leaves, trodden out of all shape and beauty by the feet that were continually traversing the narrow village paths, Upon the hills, and out on the broad highway, the scene was dreary enough. But the little village of Banley, with its red-tiled roofs and lat- ticed windows, all aglow with the blaze of fire-light, wore a look of cheer- ful comfort, hightened by the wintry aspect se Rng f Banley, lying far inland, was one of those primitive little places where the sound of the rail way-whistle had never come. There wasa branch- line, it is true, some twelve miles away, but few of its passengers ever found their way across the hills, and few of the inhabitants of Banley had seen the station, or tested the capabilities of the wondrous iron horse. Those who had done so, having returned in safety, became oracles among their neighbors, as people of deep experience, and one word of theirs out- weighed a score from others who had not “seen the world.”