Having left the company, and wending my lonely way through the streets of Berlin, I felt myself to be in a state of lively excitement. The events of the evening passed once more before me, and ere long I was in that incomprehensible mystical mood, which comes so suddenly we know not how or whence. I was quite capable of calling to the spirits that seemed to float about me: “Answer me, if ye hear me!” when the sound of a passing carriage called me back to reality, and my gaze turned from the stars of heaven to a pair of star-like earthly orbs whose mild light shone for a passing moment with full radiance into my soul. These starry eyes belonged to a young lady who was seated by your side in the carriage. At that moment I was seized with the purpose I am now carrying out. I herewith enclose an unsealed letter to the lovely possessor of those gleaming stars, and I leave it to your never-erring tact to decide, after having read the letter, whether you will hand it to the young lady, who is doubtless one of your intimate circle of acquaintances, or consign it to the atoning flames of your grate.--Yours most sincerely, VON SCH. II. HIGHLY-ESTEEMED MISS,--If Frau von B. should decide to give these lines into your hands, I shall consider it as a mark of confidence in me which encourages me in a measure to express to you a very singular request, as I am about to do. Perhaps you would have the goodness to look upon this mark of confidence on the part of so admirable a lady as a sort of pledge of my character, on the strength of which you will kindly permit me to conceal my name and social functions. At the same time I shall endeavour, dear Fraulein, to remain in complete ignorance so far as you are concerned. After these preliminaries touching the scenic arrangement, permit me to come to the point. I am sure you, as well as most persons possessing a lively imagination, have had occasion in life to observe the following occurrence. We stroll through the crowd of a large town thinking of nothing in particular, and indifferently passing a thousand faces that meet ours with the same indifference.... And in the midst of this placid, colourless mood we are suddenly surprised and fascinated by a pair of eyes that unexpectedly emerge out of the senseless crowd to meet ours for a second and then to disappear again. But what a wealth of experience lies in that passing moment! We know for certain that never in our past life has that face crossed our path, but the sight has touched us with an electric thrill. And as our soul rises into our eyes to greet that other soul, a hundred questions and answers fly back and forth with the rapidity of lightning. “Who art thou? I have so much to say to thee. Secrets I scarce dare whisper to myself, I would entrust to thee. I feel that there is an invisible band between us.” “Ah, I feel it too! It would bind us closer than all other human bands.”