“I wish,” replied he, “this be not the hour, the very hour!” pretending (naughty gentleman!—­What ways these men have!) to sigh.

She went again to the side-board, and put her handkerchief upon it.  Mr. B. followed, and observed all her motions.  She drank a glass of lemonade, as he of Burgundy; and a person in a domino, supposed to be the King, passing by, took up every one’s attention but Mr. B.’s who eyed her handkerchief, not doubting but she laid it there on purpose to forget to take it up.  Accordingly she left it there; and slipping by him, he, unobserved, as he believes, put it in his pocket, and at the corner found the cover of a letter—­“To the Right Honourable the Countess Dowager of ——­”

That after this, the fair Nun was so shy, so reserved, and seemed so studiously to avoid him, that he had no opportunity to return her handkerchief; and the Fanatic observing how she shunned him, said, in French, “What, Monsieur, have you done to your Nun?”

“I found her to be a very coquette; and told her so; and she is offended.”

“How could you affront a lady,” replied he, “with such a charming face?

“By that I had reason to think,” said Mr. B., “that he had seen her unmask; and I said, ’It becomes not any character, but that you wear, to pry into the secrets of others, in order to make ill-natured remarks, and perhaps to take ungentlemanlike advantages.’”

“No man should make that observation,” returned he, “whose views would bear prying into.”

“I was nettled,” said Mr. B., “at this warm retort, and drew aside my mask:  ‘Nor would any man, who wore not a mask, tell me so!’

“He took not the challenge, and slid from me, and I saw him no more that night.”

“So!” thought I, “another instance this might have been of the glorious consequences of masquerading.”  O my lady, these masquerades are abominable things!

The King, they said, met with a free speaker that night:  in truth, I was not very sorry for it; for if monarchs will lay aside their sovereign distinctions, and mingle thus in masquerade with the worst as well as the highest (I cannot say best) of their subjects, let ’em take the consequence.  Perhaps they might have a chance to hear more truth here than in their palaces—­the only good that possibly can accrue from them—­that is to say, if they made a good use of it when they heard it.  For you see, my monarch, though he told the truth, as it happened, received the hint with more resentment than thankfulness!—­So, ’tis too likely did the monarch of us both.

And now, my lady, you need not doubt, that so polite a gentleman would find an opportunity to return the Nun her handkerchief!—­To be sure he would:  for what man of honour would rob a lady of any part of her apparel?  And should he, that wanted to steal a heart content himself with a handkerchief?—­No no, that was not to be expected.  So, what does he do, but resolve, the very next day, after dinner, to pursue this affair:  accordingly, the poor Quaker little thinking of the matter, away goes her naughty Spaniard, to find out his Nun at her grate, or in her parlour rather.