He had never beheld any thing so beautiful, any thing which struck him with such strange, mingled, and sudden sensations, as this face. He gazed and gazed on it, hardly knowing where he was, or what he was doing, until the line of vehicles began again to move on. Then--after first ascertaining the number of the house--he flung himself back in the carriage, and tried to examine his own feelings, to reason himself into self-possession; but it was all in vain. He was seized with that amiable form of social monomania, called "love at first sight." He entered the palace, greeted his friends, and performed all the necessary Court ceremonies, feeling the whole time like a man in a trance. He spoke mechanically, and moved mechanically--the lovely face in the balcony occupied his thoughts, to the exclusion of every thing else. On his return home, he had engagements for the afternoon and the evening--he forgot and broke them all; and walked back to St. James's Street as soon as he had changed his dress. The balcony was empty; the sight-seers, who had filled it but a few hours before, had departed--but obstacles of all sorts now tended only to stimulate Mr. Streatfield; he was determined to ascertain the parentage of the young lady, determined to look on the lovely face again--the thermometer of his heart had risen already to Fever Heat! Without loss of time, the shopkeeper to whom the house belonged was bribed to loquacity by a purchase. All that he could tell, in answer to inquiries, was that he had let his lodgings to an elderly gentleman and his wife, from the country, who had asked some friends into their balcony to see the carriages go to the _levee_. Nothing daunted, Mr. Streatfield questioned and questioned again. What was the old gentleman's name?--Dimsdale.--Could he see Mr. Dimsdale's servant?--The obsequious shopkeeper had no doubt that he could: Mr. Dimsdale's servant should be sent for immediately.