18 h 7 minAudiobook14 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 18 h 7 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the friend you trust most sees your kindness as his surest way to wealth?
In Tobias Smollett’s The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, a poor-born swindler turns charm into a livelihood. Moving through Europe and England, Ferdinand Fathom poses as a nobleman and studies the trust of strangers. Gambling tables, inns and courts offer fresh chances to win money and comfort at someone else’s expense.
Among those who trust him is Renaldo, Count Melvil, an honest young nobleman whose generosity makes him an inviting target. Smollett places real honour beside calculated deceit, asking what happens when good faith meets a man without conscience. This dark adventure uses sharp satire to expose fraud, vanity and the hunger for success.
What you’ll discover
- Charm with a purpose Watch Fathom turn polished manners and a borrowed title into tools for exploitation.
- An honest friend's trust Meet Renaldo, whose open heart leaves him exposed to a calculating companion.
- A world of opportunities Travel through European cities where gambling tables, inns and courts give deception room to flourish.
- Satire with sharp edges Explore a society where reputation and ambition give a persuasive cheat his opening.
- Vice in plain sight Follow a villain rather than a lovable rogue, and confront the human cost of fraud.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy rogues, con artists, and sharp satire will love this novel. Admirers of Fielding or Dickens will relish its scams, duels, and charming villain.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A camp follower's son learns charm before conscience
- Fathom plots with a maid to rob his patron
- Two women in one house cannot hold him
- Terror in a forest, dice in Paris
- England welcomes the stranger, then bites
- Robbed by his partners, he lands in jail
- He turns two lovers against each other
- Flattery and loneliness are the cheat's best tools
- Fear, not sermons, is the book's moral teacher
- A bold narrator, comic set pieces, borrowed grandeur
Who’s who
- Ferdinand Count FathomA charming, quick-witted son of a camp follower who wants wealth and pleasure and cheats everyone who trusts him to get them.
- Renaldo de MelvilThe honest, awkward son of Fathom's patron, who loves deeply, trusts his friend, and wants to protect his family and the woman he loves.
- Count MelvilA generous Scottish colonel in Austrian service who takes in the orphan boy and hopes to raise him as a loyal companion for his son.
- TeresaMademoiselle de Melvil's cunning maid, who becomes Fathom's first partner in scheming and theft and wants a share of his gains.
- RatchcaliA Tyrolese gambler who partners with Fathom in several countries and wants money for himself, whatever it costs his friends.
- MonimiaA gentle, devout orphan who loves Renaldo and depends on his protection, until Fathom sets out to separate them.
- Don Diego de ZelosA proud Spanish nobleman living in disguise in Paris, driven from home by a terrible act, who trusts Fathom with his jewels.
- Captain MinikinA thin, solemn prisoner who speaks in scraps of poetry and French and guards his honor with great anxiety.
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The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete
by Tobias Smollett · 1753
A wagon-born camp follower's son charms households and robs them blind as he makes his way to London.
Challenging10–20 hours to readfrançais
Excellent
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In short
Where does a boy learn to cheat the world? In Ferdinand Count Fathom, the answer is a baggage wagon trailing an army across Flanders, where a camp follower gives birth to a son and cannot say who his father is.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A camp follower's son learns charm before conscience
Ferdinand is born in a baggage wagon on the road between Holland and Flanders. No man will claim him, because his mother cannot say which admirer is the father. She follows the army of the great Marlborough, selling gin and clean linen to the soldiers. The boy inherits a strong body, a handsome face, and a quick mind, and nothing else.
His mother carries him to the Hungarian front, where Prince Eugene fights the Turks. At six he watches a great battle, and the camp is his school. She robs the dead and dying, but she spares one officer who cries out in English. The colonel, Count Melvil, is so grateful that he takes the boy into his household. Soon after, the mother dies, shot by a hidden hussar she tries to strip.
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- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 14 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1753
- Language
- français
- Level
- Challenging
Cite this edition
Smollett, Tobias. The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-adventures-of-ferdinand-count-fathom-complete.
Smollett, T. (2026). The adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-adventures-of-ferdinand-count-fathom-complete (Original work published 1753)
Smollett, Tobias. The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-adventures-of-ferdinand-count-fathom-complete.
@book{smollett2026adventures,
author = {Smollett, Tobias},
title = {The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-adventures-of-ferdinand-count-fathom-complete},
note = {First published 1753}
}
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What is The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom about?
It follows Ferdinand, a camp follower's son who uses charm and deceit to rob his benefactors across Europe. Beside him stands the honest Renaldo. The book is a dark comedy about how fraud works and what it costs.
Who is Ferdinand Count Fathom?
He is a soldier's orphan raised by a kind Hungarian count, who grows into a skilled swindler. He later calls himself Count Fathom in Paris and London, where his manners and languages win the trust of people he plans to rob.
Is Count Fathom a true story?
No, it is a novel by Tobias Smollett from the eighteenth century. It draws on real settings, such as the wars against the Turks, Paris, and London. Some figures, like King Theodore of Corsica, were real people.
The author
Tobias Smollett
Scottish novelist
T. Smollett — Tobias Smollett — was a Scottish novelist whose service as a naval surgeon fed directly into his fiction. The Adventures of Roderick Random, his first novel, follows a rough-and-tumble young Scot through shipwrecks, swindles, and the brutal world of the Royal Navy.
More by Tobias Smollett
Voir tous ses livresMore like this
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