your hands? If so, did you not feel an intellectual longing to have
another glimpse of the book? That illustration describes my impression,
and I own that I twice again went to the same _allee_. The last time I
only caught sight of the young lady as she was getting into her carriage.
As she was then borne away, I perceived one of the custodians of the
Bois; and learned, on questioning him, that the lady was in the habit of
walking always alone in the same _allee_ at the same hour on most fine
days, but that he did not know her name or address. A motive of
curiosity--perhaps an idle one--then made me ask Lemercier, who boasts of
knowing his Paris so intimately, if he could inform me who the lady was.
He undertook to ascertain."

"But," interposed the Marquis, "he did not ascertain who she was; he
only ascertained where she lived, and that she and an elder companion
were Italians;--whom he suspected, without sufficient ground, to be
professional singers."

"True; but since then I ascertained more detailed particulars from two
acquaintances of mine who happen to know her,--M. Savarin, the
distinguished writer, and Mrs. Morley, an accomplished and beautiful
American lady, who is more than an acquaintance. I may boast the honour
of ranking among her friends. As Savarin's villa is at A------, I asked
him incidentally if he knew the fair neighbour whose face had so
attracted me; and Mrs. Morley being present, and overhearing me,
I learned from both what I now repeat to you.

"The young lady is a Signorina Cicogna,--at Paris, exchanging (except
among particular friends), as is not unusual, the outlandish designation
of Signorina for the more conventional one of Mademoiselle. Her father
was a member of the noble Milanese family of the same name, therefore the