Read "The King of the Mountains" by Edmond About online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
The day that I was about to send M. Hermann Schultz's story to the publishers, I received from the correspondent to whom I had sent the MS., the following letter:
Sir: The history of the King of the Mountains is the invention of an enemy of truth and the gendarmerie. No persons mentioned have set foot in Greece. The police have never vised any passports bearing the name of Mrs. Simons. The Commandant at Piraeus has never heard of The Fancy nor of Mr. John Harris. The Phillips Brothers do not remember of ever having employed Mr. William Lobster. No diplomatic agent has known any Maltese of the name of Giacomo Fondi. The National Bank of Greece has nothing with which to reproach itself, and it has never had on deposit, any funds made by brigandage. If it had received them, it would have considered it a duty to have confiscated them for its profit. I hold, for your inspection, the list of our officers of the gendarmerie. You will find no trace of M. Pericles. I know only two men of that name; one is a tavern-keeper in Athens; the other sells spices in Tripolitza.