Finally ten months and a half had gone by and no favorable change had taken place, and Dantes began to fancy the inspector's visit but a dream, an illusion of the brain.
At the expiration of a year the governor was transferred; he had obtained charge of the fortress at Ham.

He took with him several of his subordinates, and amongst them Dantes' jailer.

A new governor arrived; it would have been too tedious to acquire the names of the prisoners; he learned their numbers instead.

This horrible place contained fifty cells; their inhabitants were designated by the numbers of their cell, and the unhappy young man was no longer called Edmond Dantes--he was now number 34..