ch 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 cradle. I was
very far then from expecting the change you have just informed me of;
namely, that four years afterwards, this colossus of power would be
overthrown. Then who reigns in France at this moment--Napoleon II.?"

"No, Louis XVIII."

"The brother of Louis XVII.! How inscrutable are the ways of
providence--for what great and mysterious purpose has it pleased heaven
to abase the man once so elevated, and raise up him who was so abased?"

Dantes' whole attention was riveted on a man who could thus forget his
own misfortunes while occupying himself with the destinies of others.

"Yes, yes," continued he, "'Twill be the same as it was in England.
After Charles I., Cromwell; after Cromwell, Charles II., and then James
II., and then some son-in-law or relation, some Prince of Orange, a
stadtholder who becomes a king. Then new concessions to the people, then
a constitution, then liberty