Curiosity, I am yet in fear, and submit to your Determination; but sure I am, not to depart Florence till you have made me the most miserable Man in it, and refuse me the fatal Kindness of Dying at your Feet.  I am by Birth a Spaniard, of the City of Toledo; my name Hippolito di Saviolina:  I was yesterday a Man free, as Nature made the first; to day I am fallen into a Captivity, which must continue with my Life, and which, it is in your power, to make much dearer to me.  Thus in obedience to your Commands, and contrary to my Resolution of remaining unknown in this place, I have inform’d you, Madam, what I am; what I shall be, I desire to know from you; at least, I hope, the free discovery I have made of my self, will encourage you to trust me with the knowledge of your Person.

Here a low bow, and a deep sigh, put an end to his Discourse, and signified his Expectation of her Reply, which was to this purpose—­(But I had forgot to tell you, That Aurelian kept off his Mask from the time that he told her he was of Spain, till the period of his Relation.) Had I thought (said she) that my Curiosity would have brought me in debt, I should certainly have forborn it; or at least have agreed with you before hand about the rate of your discovery, then I had not brought my self to the Inconveniency of being censur’d, either of too much easiness or reservedness; but to avoid, as much as I can, the extreamity of either, I am resolv’d but to discover my self in part, and will endeavour to give you as little occasion as I can, either to boast of, or ridicule the Behaviour of the Women of Florence in your Travels.

Aurelian interrupted her, and swore very solemnly (and the more heartily, I believe, because he then indeed spoke truth) that he would make Florence the place of his abode, whatever concerns he had elsewhere.  She advised him to be cautious how he swore to his Expressions of Gallantry; and farther told him she now hoped she should make him a return to all the Fine Things he had said, since she gave him his choice whether he would know who she was, or see her Face.

Aurelian who was really in Love, and in whom Consideration would have been a Crime, greedily embrac’d the latter, since she assured him at that time he should not know both.  Well, what follow’d?  Why, she pull’d off her Mask, and appear’d to him at once in the Glory of Beauty.  But who can tell the astonishment Aurelian felt?  He was for a time senseless; Admiration had suppress’d his Speech, and his Eyes were entangled in Light.  I short, to be made sensible of his condition, we must conceive some Idea of what he beheld, which is not to imagined till seen, nor then to be express’d.  Now see the impertinence and conceitedness of an Author, who will have a fling at a Description, which he has Prefaced with an impossibility.  One might have seen something in her Composition resembling the Formation of Epicurus his World, as if every Atome of Beauty had concurr’d to unite an excellency.