The Heart of Jane Warner in 1 Vol Author:Florence Marryat General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1885 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER IIL VOID. " Yes, yes! I thought so -- I knew it," exclaimcil the lawyer, us be came to a full stop, and screwed his lips together. " Pray, was the lady -- Miss Warner -- aware that you married her under an assumed name, Sir Wilfrid ? " he inquired after an awkward pause. ' Of course she was ! I had no secrets from her. She knew my father would object to the marriage as well as I did, and thought it hotter, since we had both made up our minds, not to run the risk of a refusal. Why do you ask the question ? " " Merely because it decides the matter, 6'r. Here ia the very case itself, as plain as can he. ' Augustus Henry Edward Stanhope, a minor, was married as Edward Stanhope only, in order to conceal the marriage from his father. The fraud upon the father caused a declaration of nullity.'"0 " How very awkward. I never dreamt of such a thing," said the baronet. " But wait, Sir Wilfrid, wait. The Stanhope case was only a voidable marriage. Yours with Miss Warner is actually void. Let me convince you.' Here is the law itself. ' A marriage is absolutely null and void to all intents and purposes if it can be proved that both the parties at the time of solemnisation were guilty of or fully cognisant of any wilful, essential informality, either in the authority to marry or in the declaration made to procure the authority, or that both the parties connived in, or were fully aware of, any wilful omission or illegality in the solemnization.' f There it is, you see, Sir Wilfrid," continued Mr. Parfitt, as he peered over his spectacles at his client, " as plainly set forth as it is possible to do it; a...« less