“Are you fond of literature?”
“Passionately,” she replied. “I love books dearly.”
“Then you must admire Sir Walter Scott,” he exclaimed with sudden animation. “Is not his ‘Lady of the Lake’ exquisite in its flowing grace and poetic imagery? Is it not——”
“It is perfectly lovely,” she assented, clasping her hands in ecstasy. “I suppose I have read it a dozen times.”
“And Scott’s ‘Marmion’” he continued, “with its rugged simplicity and marvelous description—one can almost smell the heather on the heath while perusing its splendid pages.”
“It is perfectly grand,” she murmured.
“And Scott’s ‘Peveril of the Peak’ and his noble ‘Bride of Lammermoor’—where in the English language will you find anything more heroic than his grand auld Scottish characters and his graphic, forceful pictures of feudal times and customs? You like them, I am sure.”
“I just dote upon them,” she replied.
“And Scott’s Emulsion,” he continued hastily, for a faint suspicion was beginning to dawn upon him.
“I think,” she interrupted rashly, “that it’s the best thing he ever wrote.”