indeed be a great chemist, and the
elixir you administered to my son, which recalled him to life almost
instantaneously"--

"Oh, do not place any reliance on that, madame; one drop of that elixir
sufficed to recall life to a dying child, but three drops would have
impelled the blood into his lungs in such a way as to have produced
most violent palpitations; six would have suspended his respiration, and
caused syncope more serious than that in which he was; ten would have
destroyed him. You know, madame, how suddenly I snatched him from those
phials which he so imprudently touched?"

"Is it then so terrible a poison?"

"Oh, no. In the first place, let us agree that the word poison does
not exist, because in medicine use is made of the most violent poisons,
which become, according as they are employed, most salutary remedies."

"What, then, is it?"

"A skilful preparation of my friend's the worthy Abbe Adelmonte, who
taught me the use of it."

"Oh," observed Madame de Villefort, "it must be an admirable
anti-spasmodic."

"Perfect, madame, as you have seen," replied the count; "and I
frequently make use of it--with all possible prudence though, be it
observed," he added with a smile of intelligence.

"Most assuredly," responded Madame de Villefort in the same tone. "As
for me, so nervous, and so subject to fainting fits, I should require
a Doctor Adelmonte to invent for me some means of breathing freely and
tranquillizing my mind, in the fear I have of dying some fine day of
suffocation. In the meanwhile, as the thing is difficult to find in
France, and your abbe is not probably disposed to make a journey
to Paris on my account, I must continue to use Monsieur Planche's
anti-spasmodics; and mint and Hoffman's drops are among my favorite
remedies. Here are some lozenges which I have made up on purpose; they
are compounded doubly strong." Monte Cristo opened the tortoise-shell
box, which the lady presented to him, and inhaled the odor of the
lozenges with the air of an amateur who thoroughly appreciated their
composition. "They are indeed exquisite," he said; "but as they are
necessarily submitted to the process of deglutition--a function which it
is frequently impossible for a fainting person to accomplish--I prefer
my own specific."

"Undoubtedly, and so should I prefer it, after the effects I have seen
produced; but of course it is a secret, and I am not so indiscreet as to
ask it of you."

"But I," said Mo