Small things you have noticed.

[closedbyrequest]

What are some of the small things you have noticed in the story? Here's one I just found. When The Count of Monte Cristo first arrives in Paris, and is talking to Albert and his friends, he is discriping Mr. Berttucio.

"Yes, you saw him the day I had the honour of receiving you; he has been a soldier, a smuggler- in fact, everything. I would not be quite sure that he has not been mixed up with the police for some trifle - a stab with a knife, for instance."

I never noticed that before. What about you all?

[veronique8]

Yes, I also notice little things which appear in The Count of Monte Cristo that I missed when I last read the book.

One plot line of thought Dumas could/should have expanded was the letter Madame de Villefort wrote to Madame Danglers regarding the episode of the runaway horses, which were stopped in front of the Count's "Auteille" house.

This was the house Madame Danglers gave birth to the illegitimate child. Granted, Mdm. de Villefort was in such a state of aggitation due to the carriage crash, she did not take notice of the address of the house. The Count gave her his Paris home address in which to contact him.

[closedbyrequest]

Perhaps Madame. de Villefort did not know Madame Danglars lived in that house. The birth was before she had married de Villefort.

[closedbyrequest]

Here's another one. In Chapter 67, "Matrimonial Plans", Danglars has had a few days of constant bad news. He goes to Monte Cristo to vent.

"'...I am safe for a few days at least. I am only annoyed about a bankrupt of Trieste."
"Really? Does it happen to be Jacopo Manfredi?"
"Exactly so: imagine a man who has transacted business with me for I do not know how long, to the amount of eight or nine hundred thousand francs during the year. Never a mistake or delay, - a fellow who paid like a prince. Well I was a million in advance with him, and now my fine Jacopo Manfredi suspends payment!"'

Could this be Jacopo from the trading ship?

[kiki1982]

It is well possible. He gave Jacopo a ship and money for a crew in payment for the information he got on his father and Mercédès. Otherwise he used his name merely to ask for credit and then get more and more, without there actually being someone that needed the money, and paying always in time 'comme un prince' (like a prince). This 'Jacopo' has sent Danglars the address of his guy in Paris to get the money, but that one has miraculously disapeared.
I can't find the first book where there is a chronology of when Monte-Cristo just arrives in Paris to execute his vengeance, but is it not possible that this is the first month he is there, and thus starts his revenge by canceling the payments already from that side, that didn't exist?
Maybe it goes too deep, but I wouldn't be surprised...

[lizzie712]

I noticed that in the chapter that the Count first arrives in Paris, at the breakfast of Albert de Morcerf, Albert tells his guests what he knows of the Count, saying he calls himself "Sinbad the Sailor" but there is no exclamation from Morrel who is present - and who would most definitely recognise the name. But he makes no connection to it and the name of his family's mysterious benefactor; he doesn't comment on it, even though he comments on the story of the hidden caves on Monte Cristo. Was this a slip on the author's part?