dead. Then his eyes lighted up with hatred as he thought of the three
men who had caused him so long and wretched a captivity. He renewed
against Danglars, Fernand, and Villefort the oath of implacable
vengeance he had made in his dungeon. This oath was no longer a vain
menace; for the fastest sailer in the Mediterranean would have been
unable to overtake the little tartan, that with every stitch of canvas
set was flying before the wind to Leghorn.

Chapter 22. The Smugglers.

Dantes had not been a day on board before he had a very clear idea of
the men with whom his lot had been cast. Without having been in the
school of the Abbe Faria, the worthy master of The Young Amelia (the
name of the Genoese tartan) knew a smattering of all the tongues spoken
on the shores of that large lake called the Mediterranean, from the
Arabic to the Provencal, and this, while it spared him interpreters,
persons always troublesome and frequently indiscreet, gave him great
facilities of communication, either with the vessels he met at sea,
with the small boats sailing along the coast, or with the people without
name, country, or occupation, who are always seen on the quays of
seaports, and who live by hidden and mysterious means which we must
suppose to be a direct gift of providence, as they have no visible means
of support. It is fair to assume that Dantes was on board a smuggler.

At first the captain had received Dantes on board with a certain degree
of distrust. He was very well known to the customs officers of the
coast; and as there was between these worthies and himself a perpetual
battle of wits, he had at first thought that Dantes might be an emissary
of these industrious guardians of rights and duties, who perhaps
employed this ingenious means of learning some of the secrets of his
trade. But the skilful manner in which Dantes had handled the lugger had
entirely reassured him; and then, when he saw the light plume of smoke
floating above the bastion of the Chateau d'If, and heard the distant
report, he was instantly struck with the idea that he had on board his
vessel one whose coming and going, like that of kings, was accompanied
with salutes of artillery. This made him less uneasy, it must be owned,
than if the new-comer had proved to be a customs officer; but this
supposition also disappeared like the first, when he beheld the perfect
tranquillity of his recruit.

Edmond thus had the advantage of knowing what the owner