"I do; that is about the distance that separates your
chamber from mine; only, unfortunately, I did not curve
aright; for want of the necessary geometrical instruments to
calculate my scale of proportion, instead of taking an
ellipsis of forty feet, I made it fifty. I expected, as I
told you, to reach the outer wall, pierce through it, and
throw myself into the sea; I have, however, kept along the
corridor on which your chamber opens, instead of going
beneath it. My labor is all in vain, for I find that the
corridor looks into a courtyard filled with soldiers."

"That's true," said Dantes; "but the corridor you speak of
only bounds one side of my cell; there are three others --
do you know anything of their situation?"

"This one is built against the solid rock, and it would take
ten experienced miners, duly furnished with the requisite
tools, as many years to perforate it. This adjoins the lower
part of the governor's apartments, and were we to work our
way through, we should only get into some lock-up cellars,
where we must necessarily be recaptured. The fourth and last
side of your cell faces on -- faces on -- stop a minute, now
where does it face?"

The wall of which he spoke was the one in which was fixed
the loophole by which light was admitted to the chamber.
This loophole, which gradually diminished in size as it
approached the outside, to an opening through which a child
could not have passed, was, for better security, furnished
with three iron bars, so as to quiet all apprehensions even
in the mind of the most suspicious jailer as to the
possibility of a prisoner's escape. As the stranger asked
the question, he dragged the table beneath the window.

"Climb up," said he to Dantes. The young man obeyed, mounted
on the table, and, divining the wishes of his companion,
placed his back securely against the wall and held out both
hands. The stranger, whom as yet Dantes knew only by the
number of his cell, sprang up with an agility by no means to
be expected in a person of his years, and, light and steady
on his feet as a cat or a lizard, climbed from the table to
the outstretched hands of Dantes, and from them to his
shoulders; then, bending double, for the ceiling of the
dungeon prevented him from holding himself erect, he managed
to slip his head between the upper bars of the window, so as
to be able to command a perfect view from top to bottom.

An instant afterwards he hastily drew back his head, saying,
"I thought so!" and sliding from the shoulders of Dantes as
dextrously as he had ascended, he nimbly leaped from the
table to the ground.

"What was it that you thought?" asked the young man
anxiously, in his turn descending from the table.

The elder prisoner pondered the matter. "Yes," said he at
length, "it is so. This side of your chamber looks out upon
a kind of open gallery, where patrols are continually
passing, and sentries keep watch day and night."

"Are you quite sure of that?"

"Certain. I saw the soldier's shape and the top of his
musket; that made me draw in my head so quickly, for I was
fearful he might also see me."

"Well?" inquired Dantes.

"You perceive then the utter impossibility of escaping
through your dungeon?"

"Then," pursued the young man eagerly --

"Then," answered the elder prisoner, "the will of God be
done!" and as the old man slowly pronounced those words, an
air of profound resignation spread itself over his careworn
countenance. Dantes gazed on the man who could thus
philosophically resign hopes so long and ardently nourished
with an astonishment mingled with admiration.

"Tell me, I entreat of you, who and what you are?" said he
at length; "never have I met with so remarkable a person as
yourself."

"Willingly," answered the stranger; "if, indeed, you feel
any curiosity respecting one, now, alas, powerless to aid
you in any way."

"Say not so; you can console and support me by the strength
of your own powerful mind. Pray let me know who you really
are?"

The stranger smiled a melancholy smile. "Then listen," said
he. "I am the Abbe Faria, and have been imprisoned as you
know in this Chateau d'If since the year 1811; previously to
which I had been confined for three years in the fortress of
Fenestrelle. In the year 1811 I was transferred to Piedmont
in France. It was at this period I learned that the destiny
which seemed subservient to every wish formed by Napoleon,
had bestowed on him a son, named king of Rome even in his


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