Its value could not but be very great; yet I was far from satisfied
with the accident. It was no watch of mine; nor must I keep it, if the
owner could be found; of which there could be no doubt; and my own was
gone past all recovery.

I could not let it rest. I surveyed it again, inspected every part
more minutely, and particularly examined the seals. My former
amazement was now increased ten fold! They were the very same arms,
the identical seals, of the watch on the sopha, that had betrayed the
lovely creature in the blue riding habit to Hector Mowbray! The watch
too was in every particular just such another; had a gold chain and
was studded with diamonds! It must be the property of his lordship.

In vain did I rack invention to endeavour to account for so strange
an incident: my conjectures were all unsatisfactory, all improbable.
I looked round to see if I could discover his lordship in the house,
but without success: the numbers were so great that the people were
concealed behind each other. Beside it was long since I had seen his
lordship: perhaps his person was changed, as his title had been, by
the death of his father. He was now the Earl of Idford. My surmises
concerning this uncommon accident kept my mind in continual activity,
till the drawing up of the curtain; when they immediately ceded to
ideas of a much more captivating and irresistible kind. The delight
received by the youthful imagination, the first time of being present
at the representation of a play, is not I suspect to be equalled
by any other ever yet experienced, or invented. The propriety and
richness of the dresses, the deception and variety of the scenery, the
natural and energetic delivery of the actors, and the reality of every
incidental circumstance were so great as to excite incessant rapture!