Chapter X: Book III (2)

As the unfortunate Sancho’s evil genius would have it, there were among the company that lodged that night in the house, four clothiers of Segovia, three pin-makers from the great square of Cordova, and a couple of shopkeepers from the market-place of Seville; all of them brisk jolly fellows, and mischievous wags. These companions, as if they had been inspired and instigated by the same spirit, came up to the squire, and pulled him from his ass; then, one of them fetching a blanket from the landlord’s bed, they put Sancho into it, and lifting up their eyes, perceived the roof was too low for their purpose; therefore determined to carry him out into the yard, which had no other ceiling than the sky: there placing Panza in the middle of the blanket, they began to toss him on high, and divert themselves with his capers, as the mob do with dogs at Shrove-tide. The cries uttered by this miserable vaulter, were so piercing as to reach the ears of his master, who halting to listen the more attentively, believed that some new adventure was approaching, until he clearly recognized the shrieks of his squire: he immediately turned his horse, and with infinite straining, made shift to gallop back to the inn; but finding the gate shut, rode round in search of some other entrance; and when he approached the yard-wall, which was not very high, perceived the disagreeable joke they were practising upon his squire, who rose in the air, and sunk again with such grace and celerity, that if his indignation would have allowed him, I verily believe the knight himself would have laughed at the occasion. He attempted to step from his horse upon the wall, but was so bruised and battered, that he could not move from his seat; and therefore, situated as he was, began to vent such a torrent of reproachful and opprobrious language against Sancho’s executioners, that it is impossible to repeat the half of what he said. This, however, neither interrupted their mirth nor their diversion, nor gave the least truce to the lamentations of Sancho, who prayed and threatened by turns, as he flew. Indeed, nothing of this sort either could or did avail him, until leaving off, out of pure weariness, they thought fit to wrap him up in his great coat, and set him on his ass again. The compassionate Maritornes seeing him so much fatigued, thought he would be the better for a draught of water, which, that it might be the cooler, she fetched from the well; and Sancho had just put the mug to his lips, when his draught was retarded by the voice of his master, who cried aloud, ‘Son Sancho, drink not water, drink not that which will be the occasion of thy death, my son; behold this most sacred balsam,’ holding up the cruse of potion in his hand, ‘two drops of which will effectually cure thee.’ At these words the squire eyed him, as it were, askance, and in a tone still more vociferous, replied, ‘Perchance your worship has forgot that I am no knight; or may be, you want to see me vomit up all the entrails I have left, after last night’s quandary. Keep your liquor for yourself, and may all the devils in hell give you joy of it; and leave me to my own discretion!’ He had no sooner pronounced these words than he began to swallow; and perceiving at the first draught, that the cordial was no other than water, he did not chuse to repeat it; but desired Maritornes to bring him some wine. This request she complied with very chearfully, and paid for it with her own money; for it was reported of her, that although she was reduced to that low degree in life, she actually retained some faint sketches and shadows of the Christian.

Sancho having finished his draught, clapped heels to his ass, and the inn-gate being thrown wide open, sallied forth very well satisfied with having got off without paying any thing, although he had succeeded at the expence of his shoulders, which were indeed his usual sureties. True it is, the landlord had detained his bags for the reckoning; but these Sancho did not miss in the confusion of his retreat. As soon as he was clear of the house, the innkeeper would have barricadoed the gate, had he not been prevented by the blanket companions, who were of that sort of people, who would not have valued Don Quixote a farthing, even if he had been actually one of the knights of the round-table.

Footnote 57:

Literally, what is left in the bottom of his inkhorn.

Footnote 58:

Don Quixote seems in this place to have forgot one adventure of his
great pattern, Orlando, who, while he accompanied Angelica in her
flight from Albracca, happened to intrude upon the king of the
Lestrigons as he sat at dinner in a valley; and being in great want of
victuals, accosted his most savage majesty in these words, recorded by
Boyardo, or rather Berni, in his poem intitled Orlando Innamorato.

_Poichè fortuna a quest’ora ne mena_
_Da voi, vi prego, che non vi despiaccia,_
_O pe nostri danari o in cortesia,_
_Che noi cenium con voi di compagnia._

Thus humbly requesting, that he would either for love or money give
them a bone to pick.

CHAP. IV.
IN WHICH IS RECOUNTED THE DISCOURSE
THAT PASSED BETWEEN SANCHO PANZA AND HIS MASTER DON QUIXOTE;
WITH OTHER ADVENTURES WORTHY OF RECORD.

Sancho made shift to overtake his master, so haggard and dismayed, that he was scarce able to manage his beast: and when the knight perceived his melancholy situation, ‘Honest Sancho,’ said he, ‘I am now convinced beyond all doubt, that this castle or inn is inchanted; for those who made such a barbarous pastime of thy sufferings, could be no other than phantoms and beings belonging to the other world. I am confirmed in this opinion, from having found, that while I was by the wall of the yard, a spectator of the acts of thy mournful tragedy, I could neither climb over to thy assistance, nor indeed move from Rozinante, but was fixed in the saddle by the power of inchantment; for I swear to thee, by the faith of my character! if I could have alighted from my steed, and surmounted the wall, I would have revenged thy wrongs in such a manner, that those idle miscreants should have remembered the jest to their dying day: although I know, that in so doing, I should have transgressed the laws of chivalry, which, I have often told thee, do not allow a knight to lift his arm against any person of an inferior degree, except in defence of his own life and limbs, or in cases of the most pressing necessity.’—‘So would I have revenged myself,’ said Sancho, ‘knighted or not knighted; but it was not in my power; though I am very well satisfied that those who diverted themselves at my cost were no phantoms, nor inchanted beings, as your worship imagines, but men made of flesh and bones, as we are, and all of them have Christian names, which I heard repeated, while they tossed me in the blanket; one, for example, is called Pedro Martinez, another Tenorio Harnandez, and the innkeeper goes by the name of Juan Palameque the left-handed; and therefore, Signior, your being disabled from alighting and getting over the wall, must have been owing to something else than inchantment. What I can clearly discern from the whole is, that these adventures we go in search of, will, at the long run, bring us into such misventures, that we shall not know our right hands from our left; and therefore, in my small judgment, the best and wholesomest thing we can do, will be to jog back again to our own habitation now, while the harvest is going on, to take care of our crops, and leave off sauntering from post to pillar[59], and falling out of the frying-pan into the fire, as the saying is.’

‘How little art thou acquainted, Sancho,’ replied Don Quixote, ‘with the pretensions of chivalry! hold thy tongue and have patience; for the day will soon arrive on which thy own eyes shall judge what an honourable profession it is: pray, tell me, now, what greater satisfaction can there be in this world, or what pleasure can equal that of a conqueror, who triumphs over his adversary in battle? None, sure!’—‘That may be,’ answered the squire, ‘though I know nothing of the matter. This only I know, that since we have taken up the trade of knights-errant, your worship I mean, for as to my own part I have no manner of title to be reckoned in such an honourable list, we have not gained one battle, except that with the Biscayan; and even there your worship came off with half an ear, and the loss of one side of your helmet: from that day to this good hour, our lot hath been nothing but cudgelling upon cudgelling, pummelling upon pummelling; except the advantage I have had over your worship, in being tossed in a blanket by inchanted Moors, whom I cannot be revenged of, in order to know how pleasant a pastime it is to overcome one’s enemy, as your worship observes.’—‘That is the very grievance, Sancho, under which both you and I labour,’ said Don Quixote: ‘but, for the future, I will endeavour to procure a sword tempered with such masterly skill, that he who wears it shall be subject to no kind of inchantment; and who knows but accident may furnish me with that which Amadis possessed, when he stiled himself the knight of the flaming sword; and truly it was one of the most excellent blades that ever a warrior unsheathed; for, besides that sovereign virtue it contained, it cut keen as a razor, and no armour, though ever so strong or inchanted, could stand before its edge.’—‘I am so devilishly lucky,’ said Sancho, ‘that if the case was really so, and your worship should light on that same sword, it would, like the precious balsam, be of no service or security to any but your true knights; and we that are squires might sing for sorrow.’—‘Thou must not be afraid of that,’ replied the knight; ‘Heaven will surely deal more mercifully with thee.’

In such conversation, Don Quixote and his squire jogged along, when the former descrying on the road in which they travelled, a large and thick cloud of dust rolling towards them, turned to Sancho, saying, ‘This, O Sancho, is the day that shall manifest the great things which fortune hath in store for me! This, I say, is the day on which the valour of this arm shall be displayed as much as upon any other occasion; and on which I am resolved to perform deeds that shall remain engraven on the leaves of fame to all posterity! Seest thou that cloud of dust before us? The whole of it is raised by a vast army, composed of various and innumerable nations that are marching this way.’—‘By that way of reckoning, there must be two,’ said Sancho, ‘for right over against it there is just such another.’ Don Quixote immediately turned his eyes, and perceiving Sancho’s information to be true, was rejoiced beyond measure; firmly believing that what he saw were two armies in full march to attack each other, and engage in the middle of that spacious plain; for every hour and minute of the day his imagination was engrossed by those battles, inchantments, dreadful accidents, extravagant amours, and rhodomontades, which are recorded in books of chivalry; and indeed every thing he thought, said, or did, had a tendency that way.

As for the dust he now saw, it was raised by two flocks of sheep which chanced to be driven from different parts into the same road, and were so much involved in this cloud of their own making, that it was impossible to discern them until they were very near. The knight affirmed they were armies with such assurance, that Sancho actually believed it, and said to his master, ‘And pray now, good your worship, what must we do?’—‘What,’ answered Don Quixote, ‘but assist and support that side which is weak and discomfited? Thou must know, Sancho, that yonder host which fronts us, is led and commanded by the mighty Emperor Alifanfaron, sovereign of the great island of Trapoban; and that other behind us belongs to his mortal enemy the king of the Garamanteans, known by the name Pentapolin with the naked arm, because he always goes to battle with the sleeve of his right-arm tucked up.’—‘But why are those chieftains so mischievously inclined towards each other?’ said Sancho. ‘The cause of their enmity,’ replied the knight, ‘is this: Alifanfaron, who is a most outrageous Pagan, is enamoured of Pentapolin’s daughter, a most beautiful and courteous lady, who being a Christian, her father will by no means betroth her to the infidel prince, unless he shall first renounce the law of his false prophet Mahomet, and become a convert to the true faith.’—‘Now, by my whiskers!’ cried Sancho, ‘King Pentapolin is an honest man, and I am resolved to give him all the assistance in my power.’—‘In so doing thou wilt perform thy duty, Sancho,’ said his master; ‘for to engage in such battles as these, it is not necessary to be dubbed a knight.’—‘That I can easily comprehend,’ replied the other; ‘but where shall we secure the ass, that we may be sure of finding him after the fray is over; for I believe it is not the fashion now-a-days, to go to battle on such a beast.’—‘True,’ said the knight, ‘and I think the best way will be to leave him to his chance, whether he be lost or not; for we shall have such choice of steeds, when once we have gained the victory, that Rozinante himself will run some risk of being exchanged for another: but observe and listen attentively; I will now give thee a detail of the principal knights that serve in these two armies; and that thou may’st see and mark them the better, let us retire to yon rising ground, from whence we can distinctly view the line of battle in both.’ They accordingly placed themselves upon a hillock, whence they could easily have discerned the two flocks of sheep which Don Quixote metamorphosed into armies, had not the dust they raised confounded and obscured the view; but nevertheless, beholding in his imagination that which could not otherwise be seen, because it did not exist, he began to pronounce with an audible voice—

‘That knight whom thou seest with yellow armour, bearing in his shield a lion crowned and crouching at the feet of a young lady, is the gallant Laucalco, lord of the silver bridge; that other beside him, who wears armour powdered with flowers of gold, and bears for his device three crowns argent in a field azure, is the amorous Micocolembo, Grand Duke of Quiracia; and he upon his right-hand, with those gigantick limbs, is the never to be daunted Brandabarbaran de Boliche, sovereign of the three Arabias, who comes armed with a serpent’s skin, and, instead of a shield, brandishes a huge gate, which, it is said, belonged to the temple that Samson overthrew, when he avenged himself of his enemies at his death; but turn thine eyes, and behold in the front of this other army, the ever-conquering and never-conquered Timonel de Carcajona, prince of New-Biscay, whose arms are quartered azure, vert, argent, and or; and the device in his shield, a cat or, in a field gules, with the letters Miau, which constitute the beginning of his lady’s name; and she, they say, is the peerless Miaulina, daughter of Alfeniquen, Duke of Algarve; the other who loads and oppresses the loins of that fiery Arabian steed, with armour white as snow, and a shield without a device, is a noviciate knight of the French nation, called Pierre Papin, Baron of Utrique; the third, who strikes his iron rowels into the flanks of that spotted nimble zebra[60], is the potent Duke of Nerbia, esparta-filardo of the wood, who bears in his shield for a device, a bunch of asparagus, with an inscription signifying, “By destiny I am dogged.”’

In this manner did he invent names for a great many knights in either army, to all of whom also he gave arms, colours, mottos, and devices, without the least hesitation, being incredibly inspired by the fumes of a distempered fancy; nay, he proceeded without any pause, saying, ‘That squadron forming in our front is composed of people of divers nations: there be those who drink the delicious waters of the celebrated Xanthus, with the mountaineers who tread the Masilican plains: and those who sift the purest golden ore of Arabia Felix; there also may be seen the people who sport upon the cool and famous banks of the translucent Thermodonte; and those who conduct the yellow Pactolus in many a winding stream; the promise-breaking Numidians; the Persians for their archery renowned; the Parthians and the Medes who combat as they fly; the Arabians famed for shifting habitations; the Scythians cruel as they are fair; the thick-lipped race of Ethiopia; and an infinite variety of other nations, whose looks I know, and can discern, though I cannot recollect their names. In that other squadron march those men who lave in the crystal current of the olive-bearing Betis; those whose visages are cleaned and polished with the limpid wave of the ever rich and golden Tagus; those who delight in the salutiferous draughts of Genil the divine; those who scour the Tartesian fields that with fat pasture teem; those who make merry in the Elysian meads of Herezan; the rich Manchegans crowned with ruddy ears of corn; those cloathed in steel the bold remains of ancient Gothick blood; those who bathe in Pisuerga, famous for its gentle current; those who feed their flocks upon the spacious meads of the meandring Guadiana, celebrated for its secret course; those who shiver with the chill blasts of the woody Pyrenees; and those who feel the snowy flakes of lofty Appenine: in fine, whatever nation Europe imbosoms and contains.’

Heaven preserve us! what provinces did he mention! what nations did he name! bestowing, with wonderful facility, those attributes that belonged to each; being all the while absorpt, and, as it were, immersed in the contents of his deceitful books. Sancho Panza listened attentively to his master, without uttering one syllable; and from time to time turned his eyes from one side to another to see if he could discern those knights and giants who were thus described: but not being able to discover one of them, ‘Sir,’ said he, ‘your worship may say what you please, but the devil a man, giant, or knight, that you have mentioned, is there; at least I can see none: perhaps, indeed, the whole is inchantment, like the phantoms of last night.’—‘How say’st thou?’ replied Don Quixote, ‘dost thou not hear the neighing of steeds, the sound of clarions, and noise of drums?’—‘I hear nothing,’ answered Sancho, ‘but abundance of bleating of ewes and lambs.’ And truly that was the case; for by this time the two flocks were pretty near them. ‘Thy fear,’ said Don Quixote, ‘hinders thee from seeing and hearing aright: for one effect of terror is to disturb the senses, and make objects appear otherwise than they are; if thou art therefore under such consternation, retire on one side, and leave me alone; for I myself am sufficient to bestow victory on that cause which I espouse.’ So saying, he clapped spurs to Rozinante, and putting his lance in the rest, darted down from the hillock like lightning. In vain did Sancho bellow forth, ‘Turn, Signior Don Quixote: good your worship, turn! so help me God, those are ewes and lambs you are going to attack! Woe be to the father that begat me! Will you not turn? What madness possesses you! Consider, here are no giants, nor knights, nor cats, nor arms, nor shields quartered or whole, nor inverted azures, and the devils knows what: was there ever such distraction? sinner that I am!’

The knight, however, did not regard this exclamation: on the contrary, he rode on, bauling aloud, ‘So ho, knights! you that attend and serve under the banners of the valiant Emperor Pentapolin, with the naked arm, follow me in a body, and you shall behold how easily I will avenge him, on his adversary Alifanfaron, of Trapoban.’ Having uttered these words, he rushed into the thickest of the squadron of sheep, and began to lay about him, with as much eagerness and fury, as if he had been actually engaged with his mortal enemies. The herdsmen and shepherds who were driving the flock, called to him to forbear; but finding their admonition had no effect, they ungirded their slings, and began to salute his ears with stones, the least of which was as large as an ordinary fist; but he, far from minding their missiles, rode about the field, crying, ‘Where art thou, proud Alifanfaron? face me if thou darest; I am but a single knight, who want to prove thy prowess hand to hand, and sacrifice thy life for the injury thou hast done to Pentapolin Garamanta.’ Just as he pronounced these words, he received a pebble on his side, that seemed to have buried a couple of his ribs in his belly; and gave him such a rude shock, that he believed himself either dead or desperately wounded; then remembering his specifick, he pulled out the cruse, and setting it to his mouth, began to swallow the balsam; but before he had drank what he thought a sufficient dose, there came another such almond, so plump upon his hand and cruse, that after having shivered the pot to pieces, it carried off in its way three or four of his grinders, and shattered two of his fingers in a grievous manner: in short, so irresistible were both the applications, that the poor knight could not help tumbling from his horse. The shepherds immediately came up, and believing him actually dead, gathered together their flock with all imaginable dispatch; and taking their dead, which might be about seven in number, upon their shoulders, made off without any farther inquiry.

All this time Sancho remained upon the hill, beholding, with amazement, the madness of his master, tearing his beard, and cursing the hour and minute on which it was his fate to know him: and now seeing him fallen, and the shepherds gone, he descended to his assistance, when finding him still sensible, though in a miserable situation, ‘Did not I warn you, Signior Don Quixote,’ said he, ‘to turn; and assure you that those you went to attack were no armies, but flocks of innocent sheep?’—‘How strangely can that miscreant inchanter, who is my enemy, transmography things to thwart me? Know, Sancho, that it is a very easy matter for necromancers to make us assume what shapes they please; and the malicious wretch who persecutes me, envying the glory I should have gained in this battle, hath doubtless metamorphosed the squadrons of the foe into flocks of sheep: but thou shalt do one thing, I intreat thee, Sancho, in order to be undeceived and convinced of the truth; mount thy ass, and follow them fair and softly; and when they are at a convenient distance from hence, thou wilt see them return to their former shapes, and ceasing to be sheep, become men again, right and tight as I at first described them; but do not go at present, for I have occasion for thy service and assistance: come hither, and see how many teeth I have lost; methinks there is not one left in my whole jaw.’

Sancho accordingly approached so near as to trust his eyes into his master’s mouth, just at the time when the balsam began to operate in his stomach, which, with the force of a culverin, discharged its contents full in the beard of the compassionate squire. ‘Holy Virgin!’ cried Sancho, ‘what is this that hath befallen me? Without doubt, this poor sinner is mortally wounded, since he vomits blood.’ But considering the case more maturely, he found by the colour, taste, and smell, that it was not blood, but the balsam he had seen him drink: and such was the loathing he conceived at this recognition, that his stomach turned, and he emptied his bowels upon his master; so that both of them remained in a handsome pickle. Sancho ran to his ass, for a towel to clean them, and some application for his master’s hurt; but when he missed his bags, he had well-nigh lost his senses; he cursed his fate again, and determined with himself to leave the knight, and return to his habitation, even though he should lose his wages for the time he had already served, as well as his hopes of governing the Island of Promise.

At this juncture Don Quixote arose, and clapping his left-hand to his cheek, in order to prevent his teeth from falling out, with the right laid hold of the bridle of Rozinante; who, like a faithful and affectionate servant, had never stirred from his master’s side; and went up to the place where his squire stood, leaning upon his ass, with one hand applied to his jaw, in the posture of a person who is exceedingly pensive; the knight perceiving him in this situation, with manifest signs of melancholy in his countenance, ‘Know Sancho,’ said he, ‘that one man is no more than another, unless he can do more than another. All those hurricanes that have happened to us prognosticate that we soon shall have fair weather, and that every thing will succeed to our wish: for it is impossible that either good or bad fortune should be eternal; and therefore it follows, that our adversity having lasted so long, our prosperity must be now at hand. Be not grieved then, at the misfortunes that happen to me, since no part of them falls to thy share.’—‘Not to my share!’ answered Sancho; ‘mayhap, then, he whom they tossed in the blanket yesterday was not the son of my father; and the bags that are lost to-day, with all the goods in them, belonged to some other person.’—‘What, hast thou lost the bags, Sancho!’ cried Don Quixote. ‘Yes, sure,’ said the other. ‘At that rate, then, we have no victuals to eat?’ resumed the knight. ‘That would certainly be the case,’ answered the squire, ‘if the meadows did not furnish those herbs you say you know with which unfortunate knights like your worship are wont to make up such losses.’—‘Yes, but for all that,’ replied Don Quixote, ‘I could at present relish a luncheon of brown bread, or a loaf, with a couple of red herrings, better than all the herbs described by Dioscorides, even with the annotations of Doctor Laguna; but, nevertheless, mount thy beast, honest Sancho, and follow me. God, who provides all things, will not be wanting to us; more especially as we are employed in his immediate service: he faileth not to provide for the gnats of the air, the insects of the earth, the spawn of the sea; and is so beneficent, as to cause the sun to shine upon the good and bad, and sendeth rain to the wicked as well as the righteous.’—‘Your worship,’ said Sancho, ‘is more fit to be a preacher than a knight-errant.’—‘Knights-errant,’ replied his master, ‘ever had, and ought to have, some knowledge of every thing; nay, some there have been in times past, who would stop to make a sermon or discourse upon the highway, with as much eloquence as if they had taken their degrees at the university of Paris: from whence it maybe inferred, that the lance was never blunted by the pen, nor the quill impeded by the lance.’—‘What your worship observes may be very true,’ said Sancho; ‘but, in the mean time, let us leave this place, and endeavour to get a night’s lodging in some house or other, where, God grant there may be neither blankets nor blanketeers, nor phantoms, nor inchanted Moors; else, may the devil confound both hook and crook!’

‘Implore the protection of God, my son,’ answered the knight, ‘and lead me where thou wilt: for this once, I leave our lodging to thy care; but reach hither thy hand, and feel with thy finger how many teeth I have lost on this right side of my upper jaw, which is the place that gives me the greatest pain.’ Sancho introduced his fingers, and having carefully examined his gums. ‘How many teeth,’ said he, was your worship wont to have in this place?’—‘Four, besides the dog-tooth,’ answered Don Quixote, ‘all of them sound and whole.’—‘Consider what your worship says,’ replied Sancho. ‘I say, four, if not five,’ resumed the knight; ‘for, in all my life, I never lost tooth or fang, either by worm, rheum, or scurvy.’—‘At present,’ said the squire, ‘in that part of the lower jaw, your worship has but two grinders and a half; and above, neither half nor whole; all is smooth as the palm of my hand.’—‘Cruel fortune!’ cried Don Quixote, hearing this melancholy piece of news; ‘would they had rather demolished a limb, so it had not been the sword-arm: for I would have thee to know, Sancho, that a mouth without grinders, is like a mill without a milstone; and a tooth is worth a treasure[61]; but such mischances always attend us who profess the strict order of chivalry. Get up, friend, and lead the way, and I will follow at thy own pace.’ Sancho complied with his desire, and took the way that seemed most likely to lead to some accommodation, without quitting the high road, which was thereabouts very much frequented. While they jogged on softly, because the pain in Don Quixote’s jaws would not suffer him to be quiet, or exert himself in pushing forward, Sancho being desirous of entertaining and diverting him with his discourse, said, among other things, what will be rehearsed in the following chapter.

Footnote 59:

In the original, from Ceca to Mecca; a phrase derived from the customs
of the Moors, who used to go in pilgrimage to these two places. Ceca
was in the city of Cordova.

Footnote 60:

Zebra is a beautiful creature, native of Arabia, vulgarly called the
wild ass.

Footnote 61:

I have endeavoured to preserve an alliteration in tooth and treasure,
after the example of Cervantes, who seems to have intended it, in the
words _diente_ and _diamante_.

CHAP. V.
AN ACCOUNT OF THE SAGE DISCOURSE THAT PASSED BETWEEN SANCHO AND HIS
MASTER—THE SUCCEEDING ADVENTURE OF THE CORPSE—WITH OTHER REMARKABLE
EVENTS.

‘In my opinion, my good master, all the misventures, which have this day happened to us, are designed as a punishment for the sins committed by your worship, in neglecting to fulfil the oath you took, not to eat off a table-cloth, nor solace yourself with the queen; together with all the rest that follows, which your worship swore to observe, until such time as you could carry off that helmet of Malandrino, or how d’ye call the Moor? for I don’t remember his right name.’—‘Thou art very much in the right,’ said Don Quixote: ‘to deal ingenuously with thee, Sancho, that affair had actually slipt out of my remembrance; and thou mayest depend upon it, that affair of the blanketing happened to thee, for the fault thou wast guilty of, in omitting to put me in mind of it in time: but I will make an atonement; for there are methods for compounding every thing, in the order of chivalry.’—‘Did I swear any thing?’ replied Sancho. ‘Your not having sworn is of no importance,’ said Don Quixote; ‘it is enough that I know you to be concerned as an accessary; and whether that be the case or not, it will not be amiss to provide a remedy.’—‘Well, then,’ replied the squire, ‘I hope your worship will not forget this, as you did the oath: perhaps the phantoms may take it in their heads again to divert themselves with me, and even with your worship, if they find you obstinate.’

In this and other such discourse, night overtook them in the midst of their journey, before they could light on or discover any house where they could procure lodging; and what was worse, they were almost famished; for in their bags they had lost their whole buttery and provision: nay, to crown their misfortune, an adventure happened to them, that, without any exaggeration, might have actually passed for something preternatural. Though the night shut in very dark, they continued travelling; Sancho believing, that, as they were in the king’s highway, they should probably find an inn at the distance of a league or two.

Jogging on, therefore, under cloud of night, the squire exceeding hungry, and the master very well disposed to eat, they descried upon the road before them a vast number of lights, that seemed like moving stars, approaching them. Sancho was confounded at the sight, the meaning of which even Don Quixote could not comprehend: the one checked his ass, the other pulled in his horse’s bridle, and both halted, in order to gaze attentively at the apparition of the lights, which seemed to increase the nearer they came. This being perceived by the squire, he began to quake like quicksilver; and the hair bristled up on Don Quixote’s head: nevertheless, recollecting himself a little, ‘Without doubt, Sancho,’ said he, ‘this must be a vast and perilous adventure in which I shall be obliged to exert my whole strength and prowess.’—‘Woe is me!’ cried Sancho, ‘if perchance this should be an adventure of phantoms, as I am afraid it is, where shall I find ribs for the occasion?’—‘Phantoms or not phantoms,’ said the knight, ‘I will not suffer them to touch a thread of thy cloaths: if they made merry at thy expence before, it was owing to my incapacity to climb over the yard wall; but at present we are in an open field, where I can manage my sword as I please.’—‘But if they should benumb and bewitch you, as they did in the morning,’ said the squire, ‘what benefit shall I receive from being in the open field?’—‘Be that as it will,’ replied Don Quixote, ‘I beseech thee, Sancho, be of good courage, and thou shalt soon know by experience how much I am master of that virtue.’ Sancho accordingly promised to do his best, with God’s assistance. Then they both stepped to one side of the road, and began to gaze again with great attention. While they were thus endeavouring to discern the meaning of the lights, they perceived a great number of persons in white; which dreadful vision entirely extinguished the courage of Sancho Panza, whose teeth began to chatter, as if he had been in the cold fit of an ague; and this agitation and chattering increased, when they saw them more distinctly; for, first and foremost appeared about twenty persons on horseback, all of them cloathed in white, with each a lighted flambeau in his hand, muttering in a low and plaintive tone. Behind them came a litter covered with black, followed by six mounted cavaliers in deep mourning, that trailed at the very heels of their mules, which were easily distinguished from horses by the slowness of their pace.

This strange vision, at such an hour, and in such a desart place, was surely sufficient to smite the heart of Sancho with fear, and even make an impression upon his master; and this would have been the case, had he been any other than Don Quixote; as for the squire, his whole stock of resolution went to wreck. It was not so with his master, whose imagination clearly represented to him, that this was exactly an adventure of the same kind with those he had read in books of chivalry; that the close litter was a bier, in which was carried some dead or wounded knight, the revenge of whose wrongs was reserved for him alone: wherefore, without canvassing the matter any farther, he set his lance in the rest, fixed himself in his seat, and with the most genteel and gallant deportment, placing himself in the middle of the road, through which they were indispensibly obliged to pass, he raised his voice, and called to them as they approached—

‘Halt, knights, whosoever ye are, and give an account of yourselves: whence come ye? whither go ye? and what are you carrying off in that bier? for, in all appearance, you have either done or received an injury; and it is necessary and convenient that I should know it, in order to chastise you for what you are now doing, or revenge the wrong you have already done.’—‘We are at present in a hurry,’ replied one of the phantoms in white; ‘the inn we intend to lodge at is far off, and we cannot stay to give such a tedious account as you desire.’ So saying, he spurred on his mule; while Don Quixote, mightily incensed at this reply, laid hold of his bridle, saying, ‘Stand, and answer the questions I have asked, with more civility; otherwise I will give battle to you all.’

The mule being skittish, was frighted in such a manner, at being seized by the bridle, that rearing on her hind feet, she fell backward upon her rider; and a servant on foot, seeing his master fall, began to revile Don Quixote, whose choler being already provoked, he couched his lance, and without hesitation attacked one of the mourners, who soon fell to the ground, most miserably mauled; then wheeling about upon the rest, it was surprizing to see with what dispatch he assaulted and put them to the rout! while Rozinante acted with such agility and fury, that one would have sworn, at that instant, a pair of wings had sprung from his back. All the squadron arrayed in white, was composed of timorous and unarmed people, who were fain to get out of the fray as soon as possible, and began to fly across the plain, with their lighted torches like so many maskers in carnival time. The mourners being involved and intangled in their long robes, could not stir out of the way; so that Don Quixote, without running any risk, drubbed them all round, and obliged them at length to quit the field, much against their inclination; for they actually believed he was no man, but a devil incarnate, who lay in wait to carry off the dead body that was in the litter.

All this while Sancho stood beholding with admiration the courage and intrepidity of the knight; saying within himself, ‘This master of mine is certainly as strong and valiant as he pretends to be.’

Meanwhile, Don Quixote, by the light of a torch that lay burning on the ground, perceiving the first whom the mule overthrew, rode up to him, and clapping the point of his lance to the poor man’s throat, commanded him to yield, otherwise he would put him to death. To this declaration the other answered, ‘Methinks I am already sufficiently quiet; for one of my legs is broke, so that I cannot stir; I beseech your worship, therefore, if you be a Christian, not to kill me, as in so doing you will commit the horrid sin of sacrilege; for I am a licentiate, and have taken holy orders.’—‘If you are an ecclesiastick, what the devil brought you here?’ cried Don Quixote. ‘The devil, indeed, I think it was,’ answered the overthrown priest. ‘You will have to do with worse than the devil,’ said the knight, ‘if you refuse the satisfaction I at first demanded.’—‘That is easily granted,’ replied the other; ‘and in the first place your worship must know, that though I just now called myself a licentiate, I am no more than a batchelor: my name is Alonzo Lopez; I was born at Alcovendas; and now come from the city of Baeça, in company with eleven other priests, who are those who fled with the torches; we are conveying to Segovia that litter which contains the corpse of a gentleman who died at Baeça, where it was deposited till now, (as I was saying) that we are carrying his bones to be interred at Segovia, which was the place of his nativity.’—‘And who killed him?’ said Don Quixote. ‘God himself,’ replied the batchelor, ‘by means of a pestilential calenture that seized him!’—‘At that rate,’ resumed the knight, ‘the Lord hath saved me the trouble of avenging his death, as I would have done, had he been slain by any mortal arm; but, considering how he died, there is nothing to be done, except to shrug up our shoulders in silence, for this is all that could happen, even if I myself should fall by the same hand; and I desire your reverence would take notice, that I am a knight of La Mancha, called Don Quixote, whose office and exercise is to travel through the world, redressing grievances and righting wrongs[62].’—‘I do not know how you can call this behaviour righting wrongs,’ said the batchelor: ‘I am sure you have changed my right into wrong, by breaking my leg, which will never be set to rights again so long as I live; and the grievances you have redressed for me, have been to aggrieve me in such a manner, as that I shall never cease to grieve at my misventure, in meeting with you, while you was in search of adventures.’—‘All things do not equally succeed,’ observed the knight; ‘it was the misfortune of you and your companions, Mr. Batchelor Alonzo Lopez, to travel in the night, with these surplices and lighted flambeaus, singing all the way, before people clad in deep mourning, so that you seemed a company of ghosts broke from the other world, therefore I could not help performing my duty in attacking you; and I would have behaved in the same manner, had I actually known you to be really and truly the inhabitants of hell; for such indeed I thought you were.’—‘Since my hard fate would have it so,’ said the batchelor, ‘I entreat your worship, Sir knight-errant, who have been the cause of an unlucky errand to me, to help me from getting under the mule, which keeps one of my legs fast jammed between the stirrup and the saddle.’—‘I might have talked on till morning,’ said the knight; ‘why did not you inform me of your distress sooner?’

He then called aloud to Sancho, who was in no hurry to hear him, but busy in rummaging a sumpter-mule which those honest priests brought along with them, well furnished with provisions. Having made a bag of his great coat, into which he crammed as much of their victuals as it would hold, he loaded his ass with the bundle, and then running up to his master, helped to free Mr. Batchelor from the oppression of his mule, on which having mounted him, with a torch in his hand, Don Quixote advised him to follow the route of his companions; and desired him to beg their pardon in his name, for the injury he had done them, as it was not in his power to avoid it. Sancho, likewise interposing, said, ‘If in case the gentleman should want to know who the valiant hero is who put them to flight, your worship may tell them, that he is the famous Don Quixote de La Mancha, otherwise surnamed the Knight of the Rueful Countenance.’

Thus dismissed, the batchelor pursued his way; and the knight asked what had induced Sancho, now, rather than at any other time, to stile him the Knight of the Rueful Countenance. ‘Truly,’ answered Sancho, ‘I have been looking at you some time by the light of that torch the unfortunate traveller held in his hand; and in good faith, your worship cuts the most dismal figure I have almost ever seen; and it must certainly be occasioned either by the fatigue you have undergone in this battle, or by the want of your teeth.’—‘That is not the case,’ replied his master; ‘but the sage who is destined to write the history of my exploits, hath thought proper that I should assume some appellation, by the example of former knights, one of whom took the title of the Flaming Sword; another of the Unicorn; a third of the Ladies; a fourth of the Phœnix; a fifth of the Griffin; a sixth called himself the Knight of Death; and by these epithets and symbols they were known all over the face of the earth; and therefore I say, that the forementioned sage hath now put it into thy thoughts, and directed thy tongue to call me the Knight of the Rueful Countenance; an appellation that henceforward I adopt; and that it may suit me the better, I am resolved to have a most woeful figure painted upon my shield, with the first opportunity.’—‘There is no occasion,’ said Sancho, ‘to throw away time and money on such a device; your worship has nothing more to do but uncover your face; and I’ll warrant those who behold it will call it a rueful one, without your having recourse to pictures and shields to explain your meaning; and you may believe I tell you nothing but the truth, when I maintain, though it be but in jest, that hunger and want of teeth makes your worship look so ill-favouredly, that we may very well save the expence of a rueful picture.’

Don Quixote could not help laughing at the pleasantry of Sancho, though he actually determined to assume that name, and have his shield and target painted according to his fancy, ‘I know, Sancho,’ said he, ‘that I have incurred the sentence of excommunication, for having laid violent hands on consecrated things, according to the canon; “_Si quis suadente diabolo, &c._” yet you know I touched them not with my hands, but with my lance; and even then never dreamed of injuring priests, or of giving the smallest offence to the church, which I respect and adore, like a faithful catholick and Christian as I am; but, on the contrary, took them for phantoms and beings of another world: but the case being as it is, I remember what happened to the Cid Ruy Diaz, who broke to pieces the chair of a certain king’s ambassador, in presence of his holiness the pope; for which outrage he was excommunicated; and that very day the worthy Rodrigo de Vivar behaved like a valiant and honourable knight.’

The batchelor being gone, as we have observed, without answering one word, Don Quixote expressed a desire of examining the litter, to see if it really contained a corpse; but Sancho would by no means consent to this enquiry, saying, ‘Your worship has already finished this perilous adventure with less damage to yourself than I have seen you receive in any other; but the people whom you have conquered and overthrown, may chance to recollect that they were vanquished by a single man, and be so much ashamed and confounded at their own cowardice as to rally, and if they find us, give us our belly-full. Dapple is at present very comfortably furnished; there is an uninhabited mountain hard by, hunger is craving, we have nothing to do but retreat thither at a gentle trot; and, as the saying is, “The dead to the bier, and the living to good cheer.”’ With these words he took the lead with his ass, and the knight thinking there was a good deal of reason in what he said, followed him very peaceably, without making any reply.

When they had travelled a little way between two hills, they found themselves in a spacious and retired valley, where they alighted; Sancho unloaded the ass, they sat down on the green turf, and with hunger for their sauce, dispatched their breakfast, dinner, afternoon’s luncheon, and supper, at one meal; solacing their stomachs out of more than one basket, which the ecclesiastical attendants of the defunct, who seldom neglect these things, had brought along with them on their sumpter-mule: but another misfortune befel them, which, in Sancho’s opinion, was the worst that could happen: they had not one drop of wine to drink, nor indeed of water to cool their throats, so that they were parched with thirst; then the squire, perceiving the meadow where they sat was overgrown with green and tender grass, made the proposal which may be seen in the following chapter.

Footnote 62:

Knights engaged themselves, by oath, to protect the widow and the
orphan, to redress all injuries; and, in a special manner, to defend
the characters of ladies by force of arms.

CHAP. VI.
OF THE UNSEEN AND UNHEARD OF ADVENTURE
ATCHIEVED BY THE VALIANT DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA,
WITH LESS HAZARD THAN EVER ATTENDED ANY EXPLOIT
PERFORMED BY THE MOST RENOWNED KNIGHT ON EARTH.

‘This grass, my good master, proves beyond all contradiction, that there must be some spring or rivulet hereabouts by which it is watered; and therefore we had better proceed a little farther, until we find wherewith to allay this terrible thirst, which is more painful and fatiguing than hunger alone.’ This advice appearing rational to Don Quixote, he took hold of Rozinante’s bridle, and Sancho leading Dapple by the halter, after he had loaded him again with the fragments of their supper, they began to move farther into the meadow, at a venture; for the night was so dark, they could not distinguish one object from another: but they had not gone two hundred paces, when their ears were saluted with a prodigious noise of water, that seemed to rush down from some huge and lofty rocks; they were infinitely rejoiced at the sound, when halting to listen, that they might know whence it came, they were all of a sudden surprized with another kind of noise, that soon damped the pleasure occasioned by the water, especially in Sancho, who was naturally fearful and faint-hearted; I say they heard the sound of regular strokes, accompanied with strange clanking of iron chains, which, added to the dreadful din of the cataract, would have smote the heart of any other but Don Quixote with fear and consternation.

The night, as we have already observed, was dark; our travellers happened at this time to be in a grove of tall trees, whose leaves, moving gently by the wind, yielded a sort of dreary whisper: so that the solitude of the place, the darkness of the night, the noise of the water, and rustling of the leaves, concurred to inspire them with horror and dismay; the more so, as the strokes were continued, the wind sighed on, and the morning was far off; and all these circumstances were aggravated by their ignorance of the place in which they were. But Don Quixote, encouraged by his own intrepid heart, mounted Rozinante, braced his shield, and brandishing his lance, ‘Friend Sancho,’ cried he, ‘know that I was born by Heaven’s appointment in these iron times to revive the age of gold, or, as it is usually called, the golden age. I am he for whom strange perils, valiant deeds, and vast adventures, are reserved! I am he, I say, ordained to re-establish the Knights of the Round-table, the Twelve Peers of France, with the Nine Worthies! He whose feats shall bury, in oblivion the Platirs, Tablantes, Olivantes, and Tirantes, the Febuses and Belianises, together with the whole tribe of knights-errant who lived in former times; performing such mighty and amazing deeds of arms, as will eclipse their most renowned acts! Consider well, thou true and loyal squire, the darkness and the solemn stillness of this night, the indistinct and hollow whispering of these trees, the dreadful din of that water we came to seek, which seems to rush and rumble down from the lofty mountains of the moon; together with these incessant strokes that strike and wound our ears: all those circumstances united, or each singly by itself, is sufficient to infuse fear, terror, and dismay, into the breast of Mars himself; much more in him who is altogether unaccustomed to such adventures and events. Yet all I have described are only incentives that awaken my courage, and already cause my heart to rebound within my breast, with desire to atchieve this adventure, howsoever difficult it may appear to be! Therefore straiten Rozinante’s girth, recommend thyself to God, and wait for me in this place, three days at farthest; within which time, if I come not back, thou mayest return to our village; and, as the last favour and service done to me, go from thence to Toboso, and inform my incomparable mistress, Dulcinea, that her captive knight died in attempting things that might render him worthy to be called her lover.’