'We commonly say,' replied Mr Hoppe: '"May I have the honour of dancing this quadrille with you, if you are not engaged?" But gentlemen may vary it according to taste.' 'All right; of course,' returned Isaac. Whereupon they walked to where Miss Angela Faithful, just left by her last partner, was sitting. Mr Hoppe went through the introduction; and Isaac, who, to tell the truth, felt very ill at ease, repeated the formula given him by the Master of the Ceremonies. Angela looked at her list of engagements, hoping to find she was bespoken for this dance, without remembering the fact; but such was not the case; so with a whispered 'With pleasure,' she took his arm, and they stood up in a polka. When the dance commenced, Isaac never felt so uncomfortable in his life. Where to put his feet he didn't know, and where to turn he didn't know. If he turned one way, it was evidently contrary to his partner's expectations, for they pulled different ways; if he turned another, he ran a-muck into another couple; and this on one occasion was nearly attended with serious consequences; and it was only by tearing a rent in his partner's dress that he was able to save himself a sprawl upon the chalked floor. To the spectators the performance was very diverting. To see this long clumsy yokel floundering about with so handsome and graceful a girl and so good a dancer, put one in mind, as a gentleman remarked to his neighbour, of the Beauty and the Beast. At length, after two or three turns round the room, Isaac was obliged to give in; not indeed through any feeling that he was making an exhibition of himself (for of that he was wholly unconscious), but from sheer inability to keep his footing any longer. With his head in a whirl, he conducted his partner to a seat and fell into one himself. At the end of a few minutes, she retired from the ballroom to get the rent in her dress made whole; and when she was gone, Isaac sought out Mr Hoppe, and asked him if he could tell him who the lady was and whence she came. Mr Hoppe could only inform him that she lived somewhere in Holloway with her deaf aunt, her present chaperon; that her father and mother were dead; and that the only relative she had nearer than the aforesaid aunt, that he knew of, was a brother living abroad. Isaac hinted about money. 'Oh,' said the little man, rather amused, 'she is not badly off in that respect; for she has a nice little bit from her mother, and considerable expectations from her aunt, I have heard.' O Isaac, you are a deep dog! But you had no idea that on the other side of the canvas partition by which you were standing were a pair of ears, intently taking in every word that passed--the possessor of those ears being Miss Angela Faithful. No, Isaac; you simply thought that here was the very object you were in quest of, and that you must pursue the subject further. CHAPTER V.--OUR HERO IS FULFILLING HIS DESTINY.