# Scott, *The Monastery–II*, 1860 > [!cite] > Scott, Walter. *The Monastery–II*. The Waverley Novels XIX. Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1860. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/embed/bub_gb_J8VajEBDVzkC. --- > ‘“No, Sir Priest or Sir Preacher, Catherine is not my wife … but she is handfasted with me, and that makes her as honest a woman.” > > “Handfasted?”—repeated Warden. > > “Knowest thou not that rite, holy man?” said Avenel, in the same tone of derision; “then I will tell thee. We Border-men are more wary than your inland clowns of Fife and Lothian—no jump in the dark for us—no clenching the fetters around our wrists till we know how they will wear with us—we take our wives, like our horses, upon trial. When we are handfasted, as we term it, we are man and wife for a year and day—that space gone by, each may choose another mate, or, at their pleasure, may call the priest to marry them for life—and this we call handfasting.”’ [[Scott, The Monastery–II, 1860|(Scott 1860, 112)]] ^f48081