The Count of Monte Cristo quotes

“

Ah, lips that say one thing, while the heart thinks another,

” murmured Edmond. “But, never mind, he is a neighbor who has done us a service on a time, so he’s welcome.”

and it chances that at times there are others who have need of me.” Dantès made a gesture. “I do not allude to you, my boy. No!—no! I lent you money, and you returned it; that’s like good neighbors, and we are quits.”

“We are never quits with those who oblige us,” was Dantès’ reply; “for when we do not owe them money, we owe them gratitude.”

“What’s the use of mentioning that? What is done is done. Let us talk of your happy return, my boy. I had gone on the quay to match a piece of mulberry cloth, when I met friend Danglars. ‘You at Marseilles?’—‘Yes,’ says he.

“

I never like upstarts.

”

“No, my dear fellow!” replied Dantès, “

I am not proud, but I am happy, and happiness blinds, I think, more than pride.

”

“

We are always in a hurry to be happy, M. Danglars; for when we have suffered a long time, we have great difficulty in believing in good fortune.

But it is not selfishness alone that makes me thus in haste; I must go to Paris.”

“When one thinks,” said Caderousse, letting his hand drop on the paper, “there is here wherewithal to kill a man more sure than if we waited at the corner of a wood to assassinate him!

I have always had more dread of a pen, a bottle of ink, and a sheet of paper, than of a sword or pistol.

”

“

You can, indeed, when the arrow lights point downward on somebody’s head.

”

“Thanks, Danglars—that will smooth over all difficulties. I fully authorize you at once to assume the command of the Pharaon, and look carefully to the unloading of her freight.

Private misfortunes must never be allowed to interfere with business.

”

… jailer placed his bread or the water—before he had glanced towards the corner where the straw was, the jailer disappeared, taking with him the lamp and closing the door, leaving stamped upon the prisoner’s mind the dim reflection of the dripping walls of his dungeon.

Dantès was alone in darkness and in silence⁠—cold as the shadows that he felt breathe on his burning forehead.

With the first dawn of day the jailer returned, with orders to leave Dantès where he was. He found the prisoner in the same position, as if fixed there, his eyes swollen with weeping. He had passed the night standing, and without sleep.

And desirous of putting an end to the interview, he pushed by her, and closed the door, as if to exclude the pain he felt.

But remorse is not thus banished; like Virgil’s wounded hero, he carried the arrow in his wound

, and, arrived at the salon, Villefort uttered a sigh that was almost a sob, and sank into a chair.

at least, he believed so; but here was an innocent man whose happiness he had destroyed.

In this case he was not the judge, but the executioner.

As he thus reflected, he felt the sensation we have described, and which had hitherto been unknown to him, arise in his bosom, and fill him with vague apprehensions.

Danglars alone was content and joyous—he had got rid of an enemy and made his own situation on the Pharaon secure.

Danglars was one of those men born with a pen behind the ear, and an inkstand in place of a heart.

Everything with him was multiplication or subtraction. The life of a man was to him of far less value than a numeral, especially when, by taking it away, he could increase the sum total of his own desires.

Danglars alone was content and joyous—he had got rid of an enemy and made his own situation on the Pharaon secure. Danglars was one of those men born with a pen behind the ear, and an inkstand in place of a heart.

Everything with him was multiplication or subtraction.

The life of a man was to him of far less value than a numeral, especially when, by taking it away, he could increase the sum total of his own desires. He went to bed at his usual hour, and slept in peace.

“What our enemies say of us is then true.

We have learnt nothing, forgotten nothing!

If I were betrayed as he was, I would console myself;

Oh, I would rather mount the scaffold of my brother, Louis XVI, than thus descend the staircase at the Tuileries driven away by ridicule.

Ridicule, sir⁠—why, you know not its power in France, and yet you ought to know it!

”

“Really impossible! Yes—that is a great word, sir.

Unfortunately, there are great words, as there are great men; I have measured them.

Really impossible for a minister who has an office, agents, spies, and fifteen hundred thousand francs for secret service money, to know what is going on at sixty leagues from the coast of France!

“Eh, pardieu!” said the individual whose description we have twice given, entering the door, “what a great deal of ceremony!

Is it the custom in Marseilles for sons to keep their fathers waiting in their anterooms?

”

“The king! I thought he was philosopher enough to allow that there was no murder in politics.

In politics, my dear fellow, you know, as well as I do, there are no men, but ideas⁠—no feelings, but interests; in politics we do not kill a man, we only remove an obstacle, that is all.

Would you like to know how matters have progressed? Well, I will tell you. It was thought reliance might be placed in General Quesnel; he was recommended to us from the Island of Elba;

“

Prophets of evil are not in favor at the court, father.

”

Villefort by a strong effort sought to control himself. “What is his name?” said he. “Tell me his name.”

Villefort would probably have rather stood opposite the muzzle of a pistol at five-and-twenty paces than have heard this name spoken; but he did not blanch.

“Dantès,” repeated he, “Edmond Dantès.”

Fernand’s mind was made up; he would shoot Dantès, and then kill himself.

But Fernand was mistaken; a man of his disposition never kills himself, for he constantly hopes.

During this time the empire made its last conscription, and every man in France capable of bearing arms rushed to obey the summons of the emperor.

“Oh, no; it is useless. Besides, he is almost mad now, and in another year he will be quite so.”

“So much the better for him⁠—he will suffer less,” said the inspector. He was, as this remark shows, a man full of philanthropy, and in every way fit for his office.

“You are right, sir,” replied the governor; “and this remark proves that you have deeply considered the subject.

“That is well; wait patiently, then.”

Dantès fell on his knees, and prayed earnestly. The door closed; but this time a fresh inmate was left with Dantès⁠—Hope.

“Will you see the register at once,” asked the governor, “or proceed to the other cell?”

then he began to doubt his own innocence, which justified in some measure the governor’s belief in his mental alienation; and then, relaxing his sentiment of pride, he addressed his supplications, not to God, but to man.

God is always the last resource. Unfortunates, who ought to begin with God, do not have any hope in him till they have exhausted all other means of deliverance.

Dantès asked to be removed from his present dungeon into another, even if it were darker and deeper, for a change, however disadvantageous, was still a change, and would afford him some amusement.

He accustomed himself to speaking to the new jailer, although the latter was, if possible, more taciturn than the old one; but still, to speak to a man, even though mute, was something.

Dantès spoke for the sake of hearing his own voice; he had tried to speak when alone, but the sound of his voice terrified him.

Often, before his captivity, Dantès’ mind had revolted at the idea of assemblages of prisoners, made up of thieves, vagabonds, and murderers. He now wished to be amongst them, in order to see some other face besides that of his jailer;

By dint of constantly dwelling on the idea that tranquillity was death, and if punishment were the end in view other tortures than death must be invented, he began to reflect on suicide.

Unhappy he, who, on the brink of misfortune, broods over ideas like these!

Before him is a dead sea that stretches in azure calm before the eye; but he who unwarily ventures within its embrace finds himself struggling with a monster that would drag him down to perdition.

He then gave himself up to his happiness. He would no longer be alone. He was, perhaps, about to regain his liberty; at the worst, he would have a companion, and captivity that is shared is but half captivity.

Plaints made in common are almost prayers, and prayers where two or three are gathered together invoke the mercy of heaven.

All day Dantès walked up and down his cell. He sat down occasionally on his bed, pressing his hand on his heart. At the slightest noise he bounded towards the door.

“Possibly nothing at all; the overflow of my brain would probably, in a state of freedom, have evaporated in a thousand follies; misfortune is needed to bring to light the treasures of the human intellect. Compression is needed to explode gunpowder.

Captivity has brought my mental faculties to a focus; and you are well aware that from the collision of clouds electricity is produced⁠—from electricity, lightning, from lightning, illumination.

”

“

Yes; and remember that two-legged tigers and crocodiles are more dangerous than the others.

”

Faria, since their first acquaintance, had been on all points so rational and logical, so wonderfully sagacious, in fact, that he could not understand how so much wisdom on all points could be allied with madness.

Was Faria deceived as to his treasure, or was all the world deceived as to Faria?

Dantès remained in his cell all day, not daring to return to his friend, thinking thus to defer the moment when he should be convinced, once for all, that the abbé was mad—such a conviction would be so terrible!

“You are my son, Dantès,” exclaimed the old man. “You are the child of my captivity. My profession condemns me to celibacy.

God has sent you to me to console, at one and the same time, the man who could not be a father, and the prisoner who could not get free.

”

“Do not mistake! I suffer less because there is in me less strength to endure.

At your age we have faith in life; it is the privilege of youth to believe and hope, but old men see death more clearly.

Oh, ’tis here—’tis here—’tis over—my sight is gone—my senses fail! Your hand, Dantès! Adieu! adieu!”

Faria, the beneficent and cheerful companion, with whom he was accustomed to live so intimately, no longer breathed. He seated himself on the edge of that terrible bed, and fell into melancholy and gloomy reverie.

Alone! he was alone again! again condemned to silence⁠—again face to face with nothingness!

Alone!—never again to see the face, never again to hear the voice of the only human being who united him to earth! Was not Faria’s fate the better, after all—to solve the problem of life at its source, even at the risk of horrible suffering?

But how to die? It is very easy,” he went on with a smile; “I will remain here, rush on the first person that opens the door, strangle him, and then they will guillotine me.”

But excessive grief is like a storm at sea, where the frail bark is tossed from the depths to the top of the wave.

Dantès recoiled from the idea of so infamous a death, and passed suddenly from despair to an ardent desire for life and liberty.

Dantès had been flung into the sea, and was dragged into its depths by a thirty-six-pound shot tied to his feet.

The sea is the cemetery of the Château d’If.

Thus the Genoese, subtle as he was, was duped by Edmond, in whose favor his mild demeanor, his nautical skill, and his admirable dissimulation, pleaded.

Moreover, it is possible that the Genoese was one of those shrewd persons who know nothing but what they should know, and believe nothing but what they should believe.

In this state of mutual understanding, they reached Leghorn. Here Edmond was to undergo another trial; he was to find out whether he could recognize himself, as he had not seen his own face for fourteen years.

Moreover, from being so long in twilight or darkness, his eyes had acquired the faculty of distinguishing objects in the night, common to the hyena and the wolf.

Edmond smiled when he beheld himself; it was impossible that his best friend⁠—if, indeed, he had any friend left⁠—could recognize him; he could not recognize himself.

The master of La Jeune Amélie, who was very desirous of retaining amongst his crew a man of Edmond’s value, had offered to advance him funds out of his future profits, which Edmond had accepted.

But then what could he do without instruments to discover his treasure, without arms to defend himself? Besides, what would the sailors say? What would the patron think? He must wait.

Fortunately, Dantès had learned how to wait; he had waited fourteen years for his liberty, and now he was free he could wait at least six months or a year for wealth.

Would he not have accepted liberty without riches if it had been offered to him? Besides, were not those riches chimerical?—offspring of the brain of the poor Abbé Faria, had they not died with him?

his heart was in a fair way of petrifying in his bosom. Jacopo, seeing him fall, had believed him killed, and rushing towards him raised him up, and then attended to him with all the kindness of a devoted comrade.

This world was not then so good as Doctor Pangloss believed it, neither was it so wicked as Dantès thought it,

since this man, who had nothing to expect from his comrade but the inheritance of his share of the prize-money, manifested so much sorrow when he saw him fall.

Oh, no!” exclaimed Edmond, “that will not be. The wise, unerring Faria could not be mistaken in this one thing. Besides, it were better to die than to continue to lead this low and wretched life.”

Thus Dantès, who but three months before had no desire but liberty had now not liberty enough, and panted for wealth.

The cause was not in Dantès, but in Providence, who, while limiting the power of man, has filled him with boundless desires.

Thus Dantès, who but three months before had no desire but liberty had now not liberty enough, and panted for wealth.

The cause was not in Dantès, but in Providence, who, while limiting the power of man, has filled him with boundless desires.

Meanwhile, by a cleft between two walls of rock, following a path worn by a torrent, and which, in all human probability, human foot had never before trod, Dantès approached the spot where he supposed the grottos must have existed.

This feeling lasted but for a moment. Edmond inserted his lever in the ring and exerted all his strength; the flagstone yielded, and disclosed steps that descended until they were lost in the obscurity of a subterraneous grotto.

Anyone else would have rushed on with a cry of joy. Dantès turned pale, hesitated, and reflected.

“Come,” said he to himself, “be a man. I am accustomed to adversity. I must not be cast down by the discovery that I have been deceived. What, then, would be the use of all I have suffered?

He advanced towards the angle, and summoning all his resolution, attacked the ground with the pickaxe. At the fifth or sixth blow the pickaxe struck against an iron substance.

Never did funeral knell, never did alarm-bell, produce a greater effect on the hearer.

Had Dantès found nothing he could not have become more ghastly pale.

A piece of biscuit and a small quantity of rum formed his supper, and he snatched a few hours’ sleep, lying over the mouth of the cave.

It was a night of joy and terror, such as this man of stupendous emotions had already experienced twice or thrice in his lifetime.

to all of which her husband would calmly return an unvarying reply, in these philosophic words:

“Hush, La Carconte. It is God’s pleasure that things should be so.”

The sobriquet of La Carconte had been bestowed on Madeleine Radelle from the fact that she had been born in a village, so called, situated between Salon and Lambesc;

but it was fortunate that he never knew, or he might have found it more difficult, when on his deathbed, to pardon his enemies. And, whatever people may say,” continued Caderousse, in his native language, which was not altogether devoid of rude poetry, “

I cannot help being more frightened at the idea of the malediction of the dead than the hatred of the living.

”

“You are mistaken, my friend,” replied the abbé; “

God may seem sometimes to forget for a time, while his justice reposes, but there always comes a moment when he remembers

—and behold—a proof!”

“Have you no friends who could assist you?”

“In business, sir,” said he, “one has no friends, only correspondents.”

“It is true,” murmured the Englishman; “then you have but one hope.”

“Shall I tell you plainly one thing, sir? I dread almost as much to receive any tidings of my vessel as to remain in doubt.

Uncertainty is still hope.

” Then in a low voice Morrel added—“This delay is not natural. The Pharaon left Calcutta the 5th of February; she ought to have been here a month ago.”

“

There’s nothing gives you so much courage as good reasons

,” continued the sailor; “and during that time the wind had abated, and the sea gone down, but the water kept rising; not much, only two inches an hour, but still it rose.

“And in half an hour,” said Maximilian in a gloomy voice, “our name is dishonored!”

“Blood washes out dishonor,” said Morrel.

“You are right, father; I understand you.” Then extending his hand towards one of the pistols, he said, “There is one for you and one for me—thanks!”

“And now,” said the unknown, “farewell kindness, humanity, and gratitude!

Farewell to all the feelings that expand the heart!

I have been Heaven’s substitute to recompense the good—now the god of vengeance yields to me his power to punish the wicked!”

Like everything else, we must habituate the senses to a fresh impression, gentle or violent, sad or joyous. There is a struggle in nature against this divine substance—in nature which is not made for joy and clings to pain.

Nature subdued must yield in the combat, the dream must succeed to reality, and then the dream reigns supreme, then the dream becomes life, and life becomes the dream.

But what changes occur! It is only by comparing the pains of actual being with the joys of the assumed existence, that you would desire to live no longer, but to dream thus forever.

“And you are right,” said his host; “it shows you have a tendency for an Oriental life.

Ah, those Orientals; they are the only men who know how to live.

As for me,” he added, with one of those singular smiles which did not escape the young man, “when I have completed my affairs in Paris, I shall go and die in the East;

“

I say, that when a thing completely surpasses my comprehension, I am accustomed not to dwell on that thing, but to pass to another.

Is supper ready, Signor Pastrini?”

Franz took out his watch—it was half-past four. They returned to the hotel; at the door Franz ordered the coachman to be ready at eight. He wished to show Albert the Colosseum by moonlight, as he had shown him Saint Peter’s by daylight.

When we show a friend a city one has already visited, we feel the same pride as when we point out a woman whose lover we have been.

He was to leave the city by the Porta del Popolo, skirt the outer wall, and reenter by the Porta San Giovanni;

Proud of this exploit, Vampa took the dead animal on his shoulders, and carried him to the farm. These exploits had gained Luigi considerable reputation.

The man of superior abilities always finds admirers, go where he will.

He was spoken of as the most adroit, the strongest, and the most courageous contadino for ten leagues around;

“ ‘Thank you,’ said Luigi, drawing back his hand; ‘

I render a service, I do not sell it.

’

“What a question—so truly French!

Do you not know that we Italians have eyes only for the man we love?

”

“A mere masque borrowed from our own festivities. Ha, ha, ye Romans! you thought to make us, unhappy strangers, trot at the heels of your processions, like so many lazzaroni, because no carriages or horses are to be had in your beggarly city.

But you don’t know us; when we can’t have one thing we invent another.

”

“

My first sentiment was horror, the second indifference, the third curiosity.

”

“

The scaffold forms part of the fête.

”

A blasphemy.

Honor to man, this masterpiece of nature, this king of the creation!

”

“

That is a dream also; only he has remained asleep, while you have awakened; and who knows which of you is the most fortunate?

”

He profited by this distraction to slip away among the crowd, without even thanking the worthy priests who accompanied him.

Decidedly man is an ungrateful and egotistical animal.

But dress yourself; see, M. de Morcerf sets you the example.”

As the day advanced, the tumult became greater. There was not on the pavement, in the carriages, at the windows, a single tongue that was silent, a single arm that did not move.

It was a human storm, made up of a thunder of cries, and a hail of sweetmeats, flowers, eggs, oranges, and nosegays.

At three o’clock the sound of fireworks, let off on the Piazza del Popolo and the Piazza di Venezia (heard with difficulty amid the din and confusion) announced that the races were about to begin.

and secondly, how to extinguish the moccoletti of others.

The moccoletto is like life: man has found but one means of transmitting it, and that one comes from God. But he has discovered a thousand means of taking it away, and the devil has somewhat aided him.

The moccoletto is kindled by approaching it to a light. But who can describe the thousand means of extinguishing the moccoletto?—the gigantic bellows, the monstrous extinguishers, the superhuman fans. Everyone hastened to purchase moccoletti—Franz and Albert among the rest.

In his whole life, perhaps, Franz had never before experienced so sudden an impression, so rapid a transition from gayety to sadness, as in this moment.

It seemed as though Rome, under the magic breath of some demon of the night, had suddenly changed into a vast tomb.

By a chance, which added yet more to the intensity of the darkness, the moon, which was on the wane, did not rise until eleven o’clock, and the streets which the young man traversed were plunged in the deepest obscurity.

At the Bois de Boulogne, ennui and hunger attacked me at once—two enemies who rarely accompany each other, and who are yet leagued against me, a sort of Carlo-republican alliance. I then recollected you gave a breakfast this morning, and here I am.

I am hungry, feed me; I am bored, amuse me.

”

“

They say that it is quite fair, and that sowing so much red, you ought to reap a little blue.

”

“Ah, this marriage will never take place,” said Beauchamp. “

The king has made him a baron, and can make him a peer, but he cannot make him a gentleman

, and the Count of Morcerf is too aristocratic to consent, for the paltry sum of two million francs, to a mésalliance. The Viscount of Morcerf can only wed a marchioness.”

“Never mind what he says, Morcerf,” said Debray, “do you marry her. You marry a moneybag label, it is true; well, but what does that matter?

It is better to have a blazon less and a figure more on it.

You have seven martlets on your arms; give three to your wife, and you will still have four; that is one more than M. de Guise had, who so nearly became King of France, and whose cousin was Emperor of Germany.”

I retreated with the rest, for eight-and-forty hours. I endured the rain during the day, and the cold during the night tolerably well, but the third morning my horse died of cold.

Poor brute⁠—accustomed to be covered up and to have a stove in the stable, the Arabian finds himself unable to bear ten degrees of cold in Arabia.

”

He had assigned himself the task of saving a man’s life that day; chance caused that man to be myself.

When I am rich I will order a statue of Chance from Klagmann or Marochetti.

”

“Undeceive yourself, monsieur,” replied Monte Cristo; “I am quite sure, that, on the contrary, he will choose everything as I wish.

He knows my tastes, my caprices, my wants. He has been here a week, with the instinct of a hound, hunting by himself.

He will arrange everything for me. He knew that I should arrive today at ten o’clock; he was waiting for me at nine at the Barrière de Fontainebleau. He gave me this paper; it contains the number of my new abode;

“Oh, no,” replied Monte Cristo; “I do not carry brutalism so far.

Everyone who surrounds me is free to quit me, and when they leave me will no longer have any need of me or anyone else; it is for that reason, perhaps, that they do not quit me.

”

“M. Bertuccio,” said the count, “I am very glad to tell you, that while you gesticulate, you wring your hands and roll your eyes like a man possessed by a devil who will not leave him; and

I have always observed, that the devil most obstinate to be expelled is a secret.

I knew you were a Corsican. I knew you were gloomy, and always brooding over some old history of the vendetta; and I overlooked that in Italy, because in Italy those things are thought nothing of.

you descend to the garden by the same staircase by which he descended; you stop at the spot where he received the blow; and two paces farther is the grave in which he had just buried his child.

This is not chance, for chance, in this case, is too much like Providence.

”

“I looked at him an instant to see if there was anything to hope from further entreaty.

But he was a man of stone.

I approached him, and said in a low voice, ‘Well, since you know the Corsicans so well, you know that they always keep their word.

This to me, who expected but to find a blank enclosure surrounded by a straight wall, is, I assure you, a most agreeable surprise.

I have no fear of ghosts, and I have never heard it said that so much harm had been done by the dead during six thousand years as is wrought by the living in a single day.

Retire within, Bertuccio, and tranquillize your mind.

“In order to bring this conversation to a fitting termination (the last we shall ever hold upon this subject), I will repeat to you some words I have heard from the lips of the Abbé Busoni.

For all evils there are two remedies⁠—time and silence.

And now leave me, Monsieur Bertuccio, to walk alone here in the garden.

“

You are perfectly right in objecting to them, for this one great fault⁠—that they have not yet had time to become old.

”

“

You have a right to be unjust to them, monsieur; they are your compatriots.

”

to his enemies, he was a silent, but bitter opponent; for those who were neither the one nor the other, he was a statue of the law-made man. He had a haughty bearing, a look either steady and impenetrable or insolently piercing and inquisitorial.

Four successive revolutions had built and cemented the pedestal upon which his fortune was based.

M. de Villefort had the reputation of being the least curious and the least wearisome man in France.

“

Because you remain eternally encircled in a round of general conditions, and have never dared to raise your wings into those upper spheres which God has peopled with invisible or exceptional beings.

”

I reflected long, for a gnawing ambition had long preyed upon me, and then I replied, ‘Listen—I have always heard of Providence, and yet I have never seen him, or anything that resembles him, or which can make me believe that he exists.

I wish to be Providence myself, for I feel that the most beautiful, noblest, most sublime thing in the world, is to recompense and punish.

’ Satan bowed his head, and groaned. ‘You mistake,’ he said, ‘Providence does exist, only you have never seen him, because the child of God is as invisible as the parent.

“

Enough of this poison, let me now seek the antidote.

”

“You are wrong, my lord. The love I have for you is very different from the love I had for my father.

My father died, but I did not die. If you were to die, I should die too.

”

Monte Cristo, thus attuned to the interview he proposed to hold with Morrel and his family, departed, murmuring as he went these lines of Pindar, “

Youth is a flower of which love is the fruit; happy is he who, after having watched its silent growth, is permitted to gather and call it his own.

” The carriage was prepared according to orders, and stepping lightly into it, the count drove off at his usual rapid pace.

The breakfast-room was finished in oak; the salon in mahogany, and the furnishings were of blue velvet; the bedroom was in citronwood and green damask.

There was a study for Emmanuel, who never studied, and a music-room for Julie, who never played.

The whole of the second story was set apart for Maximilian; it was precisely similar to his sister’s apartments, except that for the breakfast-parlor he had a billiard-room, where he received his friends.

… might be obtained for the ground then devoted to fruits and vegetables, by building along the line of the proposed street, and so making it a branch of communication with the Faubourg Saint-Honoré itself, one of the most important thoroughfares in the city of Paris.

In matters of speculation, however, though “man proposes,” yet “money disposes.”

From some such difficulty the newly named street died almost in birth, and the purchaser of the kitchen-garden, having paid a high price for it, and being quite unable to find anyone willing to take his bargain off his hands without a considerable loss, yet …

“Ah, but madame, does mankind ever lose anything?

The arts change about and make a tour of the world; things take a different name, and the vulgar do not follow them⁠—that is all; but there is always the same result.

Poisons act particularly on some organ or another—one on the stomach, another on the brain, another on the intestines.

There was no peculiar indication in any organ—an excitement of the nervous system—that was it; a case of cerebral congestion—nothing more. The fowl had not been poisoned—she had died of apoplexy.

Apoplexy is a rare disease among fowls, I believe, but very common among men.

”

… gainsaying the fact that a very unfavorable construction would have been put upon the circumstance if the two women had gone without escort, while the addition of a third, in the person of her mother’s admitted lover, enabled Mademoiselle Danglars to defy malice and ill-nature.

One must take the world as one finds it.

The curtain rose, as usual, to an almost empty house, it being one of the absurdities of Parisian fashion never to appear at the opera until after the beginning of the performance, so that the first act is generally played without the slightest attention being …

“

Oh, it is well enough as the production of a human composer, sung by featherless bipeds, to quote the late Diogenes.

”

… Monte Cristo in an indifferent tone, “you will do as you please, count, for you are the master of your own actions, and are the person most concerned in the matter, but if I were you, I would not divulge a word of these adventures.

Your history is quite a romance, and the world, which delights in romances in yellow covers, strangely mistrusts those which are bound in living parchment, even though they be gilded like yourself.

This is the kind of difficulty which I wished to represent to you, my dear count. You would hardly have recited your touching history before it would go forth to the world, and be deemed unlikely and unnatural.

“There go two miscreants;” said he, “it is a pity they are not really related!” Then, after an instant of gloomy reflection, “Come, I will go to see the Morrels,” said he; “

I think that disgust is even more sickening than hatred.

”

Monte Cristo had seen enough.

Every man has a devouring passion in his heart, as every fruit has its worm; that of the telegraph man was horticulture.

He began gathering the grape-leaves which screened the sun from the grapes, and won the heart of the gardener.

“

Because then I have no responsibility. I am a machine then, and nothing else, and so long as I work, nothing more is required of me.

”

“

I have just discovered how a gardener may get rid of the dormice that eat his peaches.

”

Two broke, from the heat of the fire; the other ten were sunk three hundred fathoms deep into the sea.

The sea, knowing what was required of her, threw over them her weeds, encircled them with coral, and encrusted them with shells;

the whole was cemented by two hundred years beneath these almost impervious depths, for a revolution carried away the emperor who wished to make the trial, and only left the documents proving the manufacture of the jars and their descent into the sea.

“You? Oh, you are young while I am beginning to get old. Au revoir, Benedetto;” and running into a court, he disappeared.

“Alas,” said Andrea, sighing, “one cannot be completely happy in this world!”

Danglars shrugged his shoulders. “Foolish creature,” he exclaimed. “

Women fancy they have talent because they have managed two or three intrigues without being the talk of Paris!

But know that if you had even hidden your irregularities from your husband, who has but the commencement of the art—for generally husbands will not see—you would then have been but a faint imitation of most of your friends among the women of the world.

“Not at all; on the contrary, be seated; but what is the matter with you? You look careworn; really, you alarm me.

Melancholy in a capitalist, like the appearance of a comet, presages some misfortune to the world.

”

“Alas,” said Hermine, “doubtless it is chance.”

“Chance?” replied Villefort; “No, no, madame, there is no such thing as chance.”

“Oh, yes; has not a fatal chance revealed all this? Was it not by chance the Count of Monte Cristo bought that house? Was it not by chance he caused the earth to be dug up?

“Let us not mistake,” said Monte Cristo; “

I love everyone as God commands us to love our neighbor, as Christians; but I thoroughly hate but a few.

Let us return to M. Franz d’Épinay. Did you say he was coming?”

“

Ah! there is your proud and selfish nature. You would expose the self-love of another with a hatchet, but you shrink if your own is attacked with a needle.

”

“

Yes, that is the penalty of being a living puzzle!

”

“Count,” added Mercédès with a supplicating glance, “there is a beautiful Arabian custom, which makes eternal friends of those who have together eaten bread and salt under the same roof.”

“I know it, madame,” replied the count; “but we are in France, and not in Arabia, and in France eternal friendships are as rare as the custom of dividing bread and salt with one another.”

“But,” said the countess, breathlessly, with her eyes fixed on Monte Cristo, whose arm she convulsively pressed with both hands, “we are friends, are we not?”

“But now you are happy?”

“Doubtless,” replied the count, “since no one hears me complain.”

“And your present happiness, has it softened your heart?”

“

A stepmother is never a mother, sir.

But this is not to the purpose—our business concerns Valentine, let us leave the dead in peace.”

“

Phantoms are visible to those only who ought to see them.

It was the soul of my husband!—Well, if my husband’s soul can come to me, why should not my soul reappear to guard my granddaughter? the tie is even more direct, it seems to me.”

Now, I think no more; I say only that fortune has turned against me—I had thought to gain heaven, and now I have lost it.

It is an everyday occurrence for a gambler to lose not only what he possesses but also what he has not.

”

At length the hour drew near.

Never did a man deeply in love allow the clocks to go on peacefully.

Morrel tormented his so effectually that they struck eight at half-past six. He then said, “It is time to start; the signature was indeed fixed to take place at nine o’clock, but perhaps Valentine will not wait for that.”

He sighed, and whispered a name, and the head bathed in tears and pressed on the velvet cushion of the chair—a head like that of a Magdalen by Correggio—was raised and turned towards him. Valentine perceived him without betraying the least surprise.

A heart overwhelmed with one great grief is insensible to minor emotions.

Morrel held out his hand to her. Valentine, as her only apology for not having met him, pointed to the corpse under the sheet, and began to sob again.

Take the Republic for a tutor; let us return with renewed strength to the battlefield, and I promise you 500,000 soldiers, another Marengo, and a second Austerlitz.

Ideas do not become extinct, sire; they slumber sometimes, but only revive the stronger before they sleep entirely.

’ ”

But when you have the honor of associating with ordinary men, and the pleasure of leaving politics for a moment, try to find your affectionate heart, which you leave with your stick when you go to the Chamber.”

“But tell me,” said Beauchamp, “what is life? Is it not a halt in Death’s anteroom?”

“I am prejudiced against Beauchamp,” said Albert, drawing Franz away, and leaving the former to finish his philosophical dissertation with Debray.

He was now fairly launched in that Parisian society which gives such ready access to foreigners, and treats them, not as they really are, but as they wish to be considered.

Besides, what is required of a young man in Paris? To speak its language tolerably, to make a good appearance, to be a good gamester, and to pay in cash.

They are certainly less particular with a foreigner than with a Frenchman. Andrea had, then, in a fortnight, attained a very fair position. He was called count, he was said to possess 50,000 livres per annum;

“

Oh, my dear count, husbands are pretty much the same everywhere; an individual husband of any country is a pretty fair specimen of the whole race.

”

“When I shut my eyes and think, I seem to see it all again.

The mind can see as well as the body. The body forgets sometimes; but the mind always remembers.

”

“Because, my dear fellow, you understand one must never be eccentric.

If one’s lot is cast among fools, it is necessary to study folly.

I shall perhaps find myself one day called out by some harebrained scamp, who has no more real cause of quarrel with me than you have with Beauchamp;

“

Ma foi! we live in times when there is much to which we must submit.

”

“

Ah, but the friends of today are the enemies of tomorrow; Beauchamp, for instance.

”

“I do, and I will tell you why.

When you wish to obtain some concession from a man’s self-love, you must avoid even the appearance of wishing to wound it.

”

This point of union was Noirtier, and it was he who had just sent for Morrel, with the request that the latter would lose no time in coming to him—a command which Morrel obeyed to the letter, to the great discomfiture of Barrois.

On arriving at the house, Morrel was not even out of breath, for love lends wings to our desires; but Barrois, who had long forgotten what it was to love, was sorely fatigued by the expedition he had been constrained to use.

The old servant introduced Morrel by a private entrance, closed the door of the study, and soon the rustling of a dress announced the arrival of Valentine.

Morrel advanced with a firm, manly tread, and poor Barrois followed him as he best might.

Morrel was only thirty-one, Barrois was sixty years of age; Morrel was deeply in love, and Barrois was dying with heat and exertion.

These two men, thus opposed in age and interests, resembled two parts of a triangle, presenting the extremes of separation, yet nevertheless possessing their point of union.

“Listen,” said he; “I have not the strength of mind you have, or rather that which you would not have, if instead of my daughter Valentine your daughter Madeleine were concerned.” The doctor turned pale. “

Doctor, every son of woman is born to suffer and to die; I am content to suffer and to await death.

”

“

Ah, you are only one-and-twenty, and can forget the past; I am fifty, and am obliged to recollect it.

But let us return to business.”

We know the count’s vigorous and daring mind, denying anything to be impossible, with that energy which marks the great man.

From his past life, from his resolution to shrink from nothing, the count had acquired an inconceivable relish for the contests in which he had engaged, sometimes against nature, that is to say, against God, and sometimes against the world, that is, against the devil.

“They do not want my papers,” said Monte Cristo, “they want to kill me; they are no robbers, but assassins. I will not allow the prefect of police to interfere with my private affairs.

at the fourth, the count knew what to expect. A firm and well-practised hand was engaged in cutting the four sides of a pane of glass with a diamond. The count felt his heart beat more rapidly.

Inured as men may be to danger, forewarned as they may be of peril, they understand, by the fluttering of the heart and the shuddering of the frame, the enormous difference between a dream and a reality, between the project and the execution.

However, Monte Cristo only made a sign to apprise Ali, who, understanding that danger was approaching from the other side, drew nearer to his master. Monte Cristo was eager to ascertain the strength and number of his enemies.

“No; for I saw God’s justice placed in the hands of Benedetto, and should have thought it sacrilege to oppose the designs of Providence.”

“God’s justice! Speak not of it, reverend sir. If God were just, you know how many would be punished who now escape.”

“Patience,” said the abbé, in a tone which made the dying man shudder; “have patience!”

“Besides,” said the abbé, “

God is merciful to all, as he has been to you; he is first a father, then a judge.

”

“Do you then believe in God?” said Caderousse.

“Had I been so unhappy as not to believe in him until now,” said Monte Cristo, “I must believe on seeing you.”

Caderousse raised his clenched hands towards heaven.

“Do you possess that right over Bertuccio?”

There are words which close a conversation with an iron door; such was the count’s “yes.”

The whole journey was performed with equal rapidity; the thirty-two horses, dispersed over seven stages, brought them to their destination in eight hours. At midnight they arrived at the gate of a beautiful park. The porter was in attendance;

but at the mention of Yanina and Colonel Fernand, he turned so frightfully pale that every member shuddered and fixed his eyes upon him.

Moral wounds have this peculiarity⁠—they may be hidden, but they never close; always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain fresh and open in the heart.

The article having been read during the painful hush that followed, a universal shudder pervaded the assembly, and immediately the closest attention was given to the orator as he resumed his remarks. He stated his scruples and the difficulties of the case;

“Sir,” said he in a solemn tone, “

I consider your glove thrown, and will return it to you wrapped around a bullet.

Now leave me or I will summon my servants to throw you out at the door.”

Wild, almost unconscious, and with eyes inflamed, Albert stepped back, and Morrel closed the door.

Monte Cristo took up his glass again as if nothing had happened; his face was like marble, and his heart was like bronze.

Morrel whispered, “What have you done to him?”

“M. Beauchamp,” interposed this strange man, “the Count of Monte Cristo bows to none but the Count of Monte Cristo himself. Say no more, I entreat you.

I do what I please, M. Beauchamp, and it is always well done.

”

“Yours!” cried she, throwing back her veil—“yours, which I alone, perhaps, have not forgotten. Edmond, it is not Madame de Morcerf who is come to you, it is Mercédès.”

“Mercédès is dead, madame,” said Monte Cristo; “I know no one now of that name.”

“Mercédès lives, sir, and she remembers, for she alone recognized you when she saw you, and even before she saw you, by your voice, Edmond—by the simple sound of your voice;

cried Monte Cristo, thrusting his hands into his hair; “have you seen the woman you loved giving her hand to your rival, while you were perishing at the bottom of a dungeon?”

“No,” interrupted Mercédès, “but I have seen him whom I loved on the point of murdering my son.”

Mercédès uttered these words with such deep anguish, with an accent of such intense despair, that Monte Cristo could not restrain a sob. The lion was daunted; the avenger was conquered.

The clock of the Invalides struck one when the carriage which conveyed Madame de Morcerf rolled away on the pavement of the Champs-Élysées, and made Monte Cristo raise his head.

“What a fool I was,” said he, “not to tear my heart out on the day when I resolved to avenge myself!”

it is impossible that she can carry to such a point maternal love, or rather delirium.

There are virtues which become crimes by exaggeration.

No, she must have conceived some pathetic scene; she will come and throw herself between us; and what would be sublime here will there appear ridiculous.”

The noise of the door did not awaken her, and Monte Cristo gazed at her with affectionate regret.

“She remembered that she had a son,” said he; “and I forgot I had a daughter.”

Then, shaking his head sorrowfully, “Poor Haydée,” said he; “she wished to see me, to speak to me; she has feared or guessed something. Oh, I cannot go without taking leave of her; I cannot die without confiding her to someone.”

Do I regret life? What is it to me, who have passed twenty years between life and death? Moreover, do not alarm yourself, Morrel; this weakness, if it is such, is betrayed to you alone.

I know the world is a drawing-room, from which we must retire politely and honestly; that is, with a bow, and our debts of honor paid.

”

“Now, sir,” said Albert, “if you think my apology sufficient, pray give me your hand. Next to the merit of infallibility which you appear to possess, I rank that of candidly acknowledging a fault. But this confession concerns me only.

I acted well as a man, but you have acted better than man.

An angel alone could have saved one of us from death—that angel came from heaven, if not to make us friends (which, alas, fatality renders impossible), at least to make us esteem each other.”

“Now, sir,” said Albert, “if you think my apology sufficient, pray give me your hand.

Next to the merit of infallibility which you appear to possess, I rank that of candidly acknowledging a fault.

But this confession concerns me only. I acted well as a man, but you have acted better than man.

“Gentlemen,” said he, “M. de Monte Cristo receives my apology. I had acted hastily towards him.

Hasty actions are generally bad ones.

Now my fault is repaired. I hope the world will not call me cowardly for acting as my conscience dictated.

Doubtless, although less evident, Monte Cristo’s joy was not less intense.

Joy to hearts which have suffered long is like the dew on the ground after a long drought; both the heart and the ground absorb that beneficent moisture falling on them, and nothing is outwardly apparent.

Monte Cristo was beginning to think, what he had not for a long time dared to believe, that there were two Mercédès in the world, and he might yet be happy.

Do you understand me? I love her; and I ask God and you how I can save her?”

Monte Cristo uttered a cry which those only can conceive who have heard the roar of a wounded lion.

“Unhappy man,” cried he, wringing his hands in his turn; “you love Valentine—that daughter of an accursed race!”

“Well, since you will grant me no more, I must be content with what you give me. But one word more, count.”

“Be careful; advice is worse than a service.”

“Oh, you can give me this without compromising yourself.”

… grand salon, the gallery adjoining, and the three other drawing-rooms on the same floor, were filled with a perfumed crowd, who sympathized but little in the event, but who all participated in that love of being present wherever there is anything fresh to be seen.

An Academician would say that the entertainments of the fashionable world are collections of flowers which attract inconstant butterflies, famished bees, and buzzing drones.

No one could deny that the rooms were splendidly illuminated; the light streamed forth on the gilt mouldings and the silk hangings; and all the bad taste of decorations, which had only their richness to boast of, shone in its splendor.

The crowd moved to and fro in the rooms like an ebb and flow of turquoises, rubies, emeralds, opals, and diamonds.

As usual, the oldest women were the most decorated, and the ugliest the most conspicuous.

If there was a beautiful lily, or a sweet rose, you had to search for it, concealed in some corner behind a mother with a turban, or an aunt with a bird-of-paradise.

Mademoiselle Danglars’ charms were heightened in the opinion of the young men, and for the moment seemed to outvie the sun in splendor.

As for the ladies, it is needless to say that while they coveted the millions, they thought they did not need them for themselves, as they were beautiful enough without them.

Andrea, surrounded by his friends, complimented, flattered, beginning to believe in the reality of his dream, was almost bewildered. The notary solemnly took the pen, flourished it above his head, and said:

The fowl was tender, the wine old, the fire clear and sparkling, and Andrea was surprised to find himself eating with as good an appetite as though nothing had happened.

Then he went to bed and almost immediately fell into that deep sleep which is sure to visit men of twenty years of age, even when they are torn with remorse.

Now, here we are obliged to own that Andrea ought to have felt remorse, but that he did not.

Andrea had scarcely opened his eyes when his predominating idea presented itself, and whispered in his ear that he had slept too long. He jumped out of bed and ran to the window. A gendarme was crossing the court.

A gendarme is one of the most striking objects in the world, even to a man void of uneasiness; but for one who has a timid conscience, and with good cause too, the yellow, blue, and white uniform is really very alarming.

“Why is that gendarme there?” asked Andrea of himself.

“Why, you said,” answered Mademoiselle Danglars, “that you would be condemned to die like the worst criminals.”

“Bah,” said Cavalcanti, crossing his arms, “one has friends.”

The brigadier advanced to him, sword in hand.

Eugénie closed her eyes; but though she could not see, she could hear, and the sneers of the crowd reached her in the carriage.

“Oh, why is not the world a wilderness?”

she exclaimed, throwing herself into the arms of Mademoiselle d’Armilly, her eyes sparkling with the same kind of rage which made Nero wish that the Roman world had but one neck, that he might sever it at a single blow.

I have always found them; and more—I repeat it with joy, with triumph—I have always found some proof of human perversity or error.

Every criminal I condemn seems to me living evidence that I am not a hideous exception to the rest.

Alas, alas, alas; all the world is wicked; let us therefore strike at wickedness!”

I have always found them; and more—I repeat it with joy, with triumph—I have always found some proof of human perversity or error. Every criminal I condemn seems to me living evidence that I am not a hideous exception to the rest.

Alas, alas, alas; all the world is wicked; let us therefore strike at wickedness!

”

“Adieu, madame,” replied the king’s attorney, as in an almost joyful manner he conducted her to the door. Then, turning to his desk, he said, striking the letter with the back of his right hand:

“Come, I had a forgery, three robberies, and two cases of arson, I only wanted a murder, and here it is. It will be a splendid session!”

“How do you mean?” said Valentine, looking anxiously around.

“Because you are not feverish or delirious tonight, but thoroughly awake; midnight is striking, which is the hour murderers choose.”

“Oh, heavens,” exclaimed Valentine, wiping off the drops which ran down her forehead. Midnight struck slowly and sadly; every hour seemed to strike with leaden weight upon the heart of the poor girl.

The minutes passed; Madame de Villefort could not drop the curtain which she held like a funeral pall over the head of Valentine.

She was lost in reverie, and the reverie of crime is remorse.

Just then the lamp again flickered; the noise startled Madame de Villefort, who shuddered and dropped the curtain. Immediately afterwards the light expired, and the room was plunged in frightful obscurity, while the clock at that minute struck half-past four.

And M. de Villefort, giving the key to d’Avrigny, again bade farewell to the strange doctor, and retired to his study, where he began to work.

For some temperaments work is a remedy for all afflictions.

As the doctors entered the street, they saw a man in a cassock standing on the threshold of the next door.

“Yes,” he answered, “if a fortune brings consolation, I ought to be consoled; I am rich.”

“So rich, dear sir, that your fortune resembles the pyramids; if you wished to demolish them you could not, and if it were possible, you would not dare!”

Danglars smiled at the good-natured pleasantry of the count. “That reminds me,” he said, “that when you entered I was on the point of signing five little bonds; I have already signed two: will you allow me to do the same to the others?”

“Poor fellow, what is it?”

“My grief will kill me of itself.”

“My friend,” said Monte Cristo, with an expression of melancholy equal to his own, “listen to me. One day, in a moment of despair like yours, since it led to a similar resolution, I also wished to kill myself;

Yet these two noble and intelligent creatures, united by the indissoluble ties of maternal and filial love, had succeeded in tacitly understanding one another, and economizing their stores, and Albert had been able to tell his mother without extorting a change of countenance:

“Mother, we have no more money.”

Mercédès had never known misery; she had often, in her youth, spoken of poverty, but between want and necessity, those synonymous words, there is a wide difference.

“Mother, we have no more money.”

Mercédès had never known misery; she had often, in her youth, spoken of poverty, but between want and necessity, those synonymous words, there is a wide difference.

Amongst the Catalans, Mercédès wished for a thousand things, but still she never really wanted any. So long as the nets were good, they caught fish; and so long as they sold their fish, they were able to buy twine for new nets.

she had not even one little flower—she whose apartment had been a conservatory of costly exotics. But she had her son. Hitherto the excitement of fulfilling a duty had sustained them.

Excitement, like enthusiasm, sometimes renders us unconscious to the things of earth.

But the excitement had calmed down, and they felt themselves obliged to descend from dreams to reality; after having exhausted the ideal, they found they must talk of the actual.

“Dear child!” said Mercédès, endeavoring in vain to restrain a tear which glistened in the corner of her eye. “

Indeed, you only wanted misfortune to change my love for you to admiration.

I am not unhappy while I possess my son!”

Mercédès sighed. “Well, mother, I yesterday engaged myself as substitute in the Spahis,” added the young man, lowering his eyes with a certain feeling of shame, for even he was unconscious of the sublimity of his self-abasement. “

I thought my body was my own, and that I might sell it.

I yesterday took the place of another. I sold myself for more than I thought I was worth,” he added, attempting to smile; “I fetched 2,000 francs.”

One division of La Force, in which the most dangerous and desperate prisoners are confined, is called the court of Saint-Bernard.

The prisoners, in their expressive language, have named it the “Lions’ Den,” probably because the captives possess teeth which frequently gnaw the bars, and sometimes the keepers also.

It is a prison within a prison; the walls are double the thickness of the rest.

“My father—I will know who my father is,” said the obstinate youth; “I will perish if I must, but I will know it. What does scandal signify to me? What possessions, what reputation, what ‘pull,’ as Beauchamp says—have I?

You great people always lose something by scandal, notwithstanding your millions.

Come, who is my father?”

“Are you, then, a coward?” cried Villefort, in a contemptuous voice. “

But I have always observed that poisoners were cowards.

Can you be a coward, you, who have had the courage to witness the death of two old men and a young girl murdered by you?”

“

A nobility of the rope!

” said Château-Renaud phlegmatically.

“

I do not know. Why do we love? Why do we hate? I detest her, from antipathy.

”

“

Oh, your pardon! I never visit ministers; I leave that to the princes.

”

“No, my dear fellow, it is not at all incredible. You saw the child pass through the Rue Richelieu last year, who amused himself with killing his brothers and sisters by sticking pins in their ears while they slept.

The generation who follow us are very precocious.

”

Notwithstanding the density of the crowd, M. de Villefort saw it open before him.

There is something so awe-inspiring in great afflictions that even in the worst times the first emotion of a crowd has generally been to sympathize with the sufferer in a great catastrophe.

Many people have been assassinated in a tumult, but even criminals have rarely been insulted during trial. Thus Villefort passed through the mass of spectators and officers of the Palais, and withdrew. Though he had acknowledged his guilt, he was protected by his grief.