The Count of Monte Cristo

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nothing but how he should rejoin his companion, who was awaiting him at
Rome.

He set out, and on the Saturday evening reached the Eternal City by the
mail-coach. An apartment, as we have said, had been retained beforehand,
and thus he had but to go to Signor Pastrini's hotel. But this was not
so easy a matter, for the streets were thronged with people, and Rome
was already a prey to that low and feverish murmur which precedes
all great events; and at Rome there are four great events in every
year,--the Carnival, Holy Week, Corpus Christi, and the Feast of St.
Peter. All the rest of the year the city is in that state of dull
apathy, between life and death, which renders it similar to a kind of
station between this world and the next--a sublime spot, a resting-place
full of poetry and character, and at which Franz had already halted five
or six times, and at each time found it more marvellous and striking. At
last he made his way through the mob, which was continually increasing
and getting more and more turbulent, and reached the hotel. On his