“I saw something else too. I saw that the lady by her side was a foreigner with whom I had long been acquainted; so edging my way into the passages, in two minutes I was tapping at their box-door like a man who felt pretty sure of being let in. “The foreigner introduced me to her friend, and as the second act of the opera was already in progress, told me to sit down and hold my tongue. We were four in the box. Another gentleman was placed close behind the lady who first attracted my attention. I had only eyes just then, however, for the wild, unearthly beauty of my new acquaintance. “I have seen hundreds of pretty women, and even in youth my heart, from temperament, perhaps, rather than reflection, was as hard as my ribs; but this face fascinated me—I can use no other word. My sensations were so strangely compounded of admiration, horror, interest, curiosity, attraction, and dislike. The eyes were deep and dark, yet with the glitter in them of a hawk’s, the cheek deadly pale, the lips bright red. She was different from anything I had ever seen, and yet so wonderfully beautiful! I longed to hear her speak. Presently she whispered a few words to the man behind her, and I felt my flesh creep. Low as they were modulated, there was in every syllable a tone of such utter hopelessness, such abiding sorrow, regret, even remorse, always present, always kept down, that I could have imagined her one of those lost spirits for whom is fixed the punishment of all most cruel, most intolerable, that they can never forget they are formed for better things. Her gestures, too, were in accordance with the sad, suggestive music of her voice—quiet, graceful, and somewhat listless in the repose, as it seemed, rather of unhappiness than of indolence. I tell you I was not susceptible; I don’t think boys generally are. In love, more than in any other extravagance, ‘there is no fool like an old one.’