“The ingenuity of your supposition, my dear friend, deserves a specific answer. I have indeed a familiar spirit—that is, I am possessed of a confidant, ready at all times, though absent, to chronicle my thoughts, and to express, in corresponding words, the spontaneous emotions of my soul. Nay, you need not start. The art is an innocent one, and its practice, though divulged, would not expose me in any way to the censures of the church.” “You pique my curiosity strangely!” “Well, then, listen. For some years I have paid the utmost attention to the science of animal magnetism, an art which undoubtedly lay at the foundation of the ancient Chaldean lore, and which, though now revived, has been debased by the artifices and quackery of knaves. I need not go into details. After long search, I have succeeded in finding a being which, in its dormant or spiritual state, has an entire affinity with my own. When awake, you would suppose Leontine Deschappelles to be a mere ordinary though rather interesting female, endowed certainly with a miraculous sensibility for music, but not otherwise in any way remarkable. But, when asleep, she becomes as it were the counterpart or reflex of myself. Every thought which passes through my bosom simultaneously arises in hers. I do not need even to utter the words. By some miraculous process, these present themselves as vividly to her as if I had bestowed the utmost labour upon composition. I have but to throw her into a magnetic sleep, and my literary product for the day is secured. I go forth through Paris, mingle in society, appear idle and _insouciant_; and yet all the while the ideal personages of my tale are passing over the mirror of my mind, and performing their allotted duty. I have reached such perfection in the art, that I can compose two or even three romances at once. I return towards evening, and then I find Leontine, pale indeed and exhausted, but with a vast pile of manuscript before her, which contains the faithful transcript of my thoughts. Now, perhaps, you will cease to wonder at an apparent fertility, which, I am aware, has challenged the admiration and astonishment of Europe.” All this was uttered by Monte-Christo with such exemplary gravity, that I stood perfectly confounded. If true, it was indeed the solution of the greatest literary problem of the age; but I could hardly suppress the idea that he was making me the victim of a hoax. “And whereabouts does she dwell, this Demoiselle Leontine?” said I. “At my house,” he replied: “she is my adopted child. Poor Leontine! sometimes when I look at her wasted cheek, I feel a pang of regret to think that she is paying so dear for a celebrity which must be immortal. But it is the fate of genius, my friend, and all of us must submit!”