The History of Don Quixote de la Mancha
by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra · English · Gutenberg #35993 · 1,299,488 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The History of Don Quixote de la Mancha
Author: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Translator: Peter Anthony Motteux
Release date: April 29, 2011 [eBook #35993]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35993
Credits: Produced by Paul Dring, Delphine Lettau and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HISTORY OF DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA ***
Produced by Paul Dring, Delphine Lettau and the Online
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Transcribers note: The single occurence in the original of the letter e
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THE HISTORY
OF
DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA.
[Illustration: Don Quixote.]
[Illustration:
The
history
of
Don Quixote
de la mancha
LONDON
Edward Lumley.]
The history
of
Don Quixote de la Mancha.
From the Spanish of Cervantes.
REVISED FOR GENERAL READING.
TO WHICH IS PREFIXED
A Sketch of the Life and Writings of the Author.
Second Edition,
WITH ADDITIONAL ILLUSTRATIONS.
London:
James Burns
mdcccxlviii.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I. The quality and way of living of Don Quixote 1
II. Which treats of Don Quixote's first sally 5
III. An account of the pleasant method taken by Don Quixote to
be dubbed a knight 8
IV. What befell the Knight after he had left the inn 12
V. A further account of our Knight's misfortunes 17
VI. Of the pleasant and curious scrutiny which the Curate and
the Barber made of the library of our ingenious gentleman 20
VII. Don Quixote's second sally in quest of adventures 24
VIII. Of the good success which the valorous Don Quixote had
in the most terrifying and incredible adventure of the Windmills,
with other transactions worthy to be transmitted to posterity 26
IX. What passed between Don Quixote and the Goatherds 29
X. A continuation of the story of Marcella 33
XI. The sage discourse continued; with the adventures of a
dead body 47
XII. Which treats of the grand adventure of Mambrino's helmet,
with other things which befell our invincible Knight 57
XIII. Of what befell Don Quixote in the Sierra Morena, being one
of the most extraordinary adventures related in this faithful
history 66
XIV. A continuation of the adventure in the Sierra Morena 72
XV. Of what happened to Don Quixote's Squire, with the famous
device of the Curate and the Barber 84
XVI. How the Priest and the Barber proceeded in their project;
with other things worthy of being related 88
XVII. Of the new and agreeable adventure that befell the Priest
and the Barber, and of the beautiful Dorothea 96
XVIII. Which treats of the beautiful Dorothea's discretion;
with other particulars 102
XIX. Of the ingenious method pursued to withdraw our enamoured
Knight from the rigorous penance which he had imposed on
himself 108
XX. The pleasant dialogue between Don Quixote and his Squire
continued; with other adventures 115
XXI. What befell Don Quixote and his company at the inn 121
XXII. Of the dreadful battle betwixt Don Quixote and certain
Wine-skins 125
XXIII. Containing an account of many surprising accidents in
the inn 127
XXIV. The history of the famous Princess Micomicona continued;
with other pleasant adventures 132
XXV. A continuation of Don Quixote's curious and excellent
discourse upon arms and learning 137
XXVI. Of occurrences at the inn; and of many other things worthy
to be known 139
XXVII. The agreeable history of the young muleteer; with other
strange accidents 141
XXVIII. A continuation of the extraordinary adventures that
happened in the inn 145
XXIX. In which the dispute concerning Mambrino's helmet is
decided; with other adventures that really and truly happened 148
XXX. The notable adventure of the Holy Brotherhood; with an
account of the ferocity of our good Knight, Don Quixote 151
XXXI. Of the strange and wonderful manner in which Don Quixote
de la Mancha was enchanted; with other remarkable occurrences 156
XXXII. Of the ingenious contest between Don Quixote and the
Canon; with other incidents 161
XXXIII. The Goatherd's narrative 164
XXXIV. Of the quarrel between Don Quixote and the Goatherd,
with the rare adventure of the Disciplinants 167
XXXV. What passed between the Curate, the Barber, and Don
Quixote, concerning his indisposition 172
XXXVI. Of the memorable quarrel between Sancho Panza and Don
Quixote's Niece and Housekeeper; with other pleasant passages 178
XXXVII. The pleasant discourse between Don Quixote, Sancho Panza,
and the bachelor Samson Carrasco 181
XXXVIII. The discourse continued; also the wise and pleasant
dialogue between Sancho Panza and Teresa Panza his wife; together
with other passages worthy of happy memory 185
XXXIX. What passed between Don Quixote, his Niece, and the
Housekeeper; being one of the most important chapters in the
whole history 189
XL. Don Quixote's success in his journey to visit the Lady
Dulcinea del Toboso 192
XLI. That gives an account of things which you will know when
you have read it 196
XLII. Wherein is related the stratagem practised by Sancho, of
enchanting the Lady Dulcinea; with other events no less ludicrous
than true 198
XLIII. Of the strange adventure which befell the valorous Don
Quixote with the cart, or Death's caravan 202
XLIV. Of the strange adventure which befell the valorous Don
Quixote with the brave Knight of the Mirrors 206
XLV. Wherein is continued the adventure of the Knight of the
Wood, with the wise and witty dialogue between the two Squires 210
XLVI. Continuation again of the adventure of the Knight of the
Wood 213
XLVII. Giving an account of the Knight of the Mirrors and his
Squire 220
XLVIII. Of what befell Don Quixote with a worthy gentleman of
La Mancha 223
XLIX. Where you will find set forth the highest proof that Don
Quixote ever gave, or could give, of his courage; with the
successful issue of the adventure of the Lions 227
L. How Don Quixote was entertained at the castle or house of the
Knight of the Green Coat, with other extraordinary matters 232
LI. The adventure of the Shepherd-Lover, and other truly comical
passages 235
LII. An account of rich Camacho's wedding, and what befell poor
Basil 239
LIII. The progress of Camacho's wedding; with other delightful
accidents 242
LIV. An account of the great adventure of Montesinos' cave 247
LV. Of the wonderful things which the unparalleled Don Quixote
declared he had seen in the deep cave of Montesinos, the
greatness and impossibility of which make this adventure
pass for apocryphal 250
LVI. Which gives an account of a thousand trifles and stories,
as impertinent as necessary to the right understanding of this
grand history 256
LVII. Where you find the grounds of the braying adventures,
that of the Puppet-player, and the memorable divining of the
fortune-telling Ape 260
LVIII. A pleasant account of the Puppet-play; with other very
good things 266
LIX. Wherein is shewn Don Quixote's ill success in the braying
adventure, which did not end so happily as he desired and
expected 271
LX. Of some things which he that reads shall know, if he reads
them with attention 275
LXI. What happened to Don Quixote with the fair Huntress 278
LXII. Which treats of many and great matters 281
LXIII. Don Quixote's answer to his reprover; with other grave
and merry accidents 285
LXIV. Containing ways and means for disenchanting the peerless
Dulcinea del Toboso, being one of the most famous adventures
in the whole book 291
LXV. Wherein is contained the information given to Don Quixote
how to disenchant Dulcinea; with other wonderful passages 296
LXVI. Wherein is recorded the wonderful and inconceivable
adventure of the afflicted Duenna, or the Countess of Trifaldi;
and likewise Sancho Panza's letter to his wife Teresa Panza 299
LXVII. In which is continued the famous adventure of the
afflicted Duenna 303
LXVIII. Of the account given by the afflicted Duenna of her
misfortunes 304
LXIX. Wherein the Countess Trifaldi continues her stupendous
and memorable history 308
LXX. Which treats of matters relating and appertaining to this
adventure, and to this memorable history 309
LXXI. Of the arrival of Clavileno; with the conclusion of this
prolix adventure 313
LXXII. The instructions which Don Quixote gave to Sancho Panza,
before he went to his government; with other well-digested
matter 319
LXXIII. Of the second instruction Don Quixote gave Sancho Panza 322
LXXIV. How Sancho Panza was carried to his government; and of
the strange adventure that befell Don Quixote in the castle 325
LXXV. How the great Sancho Panza took possession of his island,
and in what manner he began to govern 328
LXXVI. Of a dreadful alarm which Don Quixote experienced 331
LXXVII. Which gives a further account of Sancho Panza's behaviour
in his government 334
LXXVIII. What happened to Don Quixote with Donna Rodriguez; as
also other passages worthy to be recorded 340
LXXIX. What happened to Sancho Panza as he went the rounds in
his island 342
LXXX. Which narrates the success of the page that carried
Sancho's letter to his wife 350
LXXXI. A continuation of Sancho Panza's government; with other
entertaining passages 355
LXXXII. A relation of the adventures of the second disconsolate
or distressed matron, otherwise called Donna Rodriguez; with
the letters of Teresa Panza to the Duchess and to her husband 360
LXXXIII. The toilsome end and conclusion of Sancho Panza's
government 364
LXXXIV. What happened to Sancho by the way; with other matters
which you will have no more to do than to see 368
LXXXV. Which treats of matters that relate to this history,
and no other 370
LXXXVI. Of the extraordinary and unaccountable combat between Don
Quixote de la Mancha and the lackey Tosilos, in vindication
of the matron Donna Rodriguez's daughter 372
LXXXVII. How adventures crowded so thick on Don Quixote that
they trod upon one another's heels 376
LXXXVIII. Of an extraordinary accident that happened to Don
Quixote, which may well pass for an adventure 383
LXXXIX. What happened to Don Quixote going to Barcelona 388
XC. Of what befell Don Quixote at his entrance into Barcelona;
with other events more true than ingenious 397
XCI. Of the adventure of the enchanted head; with other trifling
matters that must not be omitted 399
XCII. Of an unlucky adventure which Don Quixote laid most to
heart of any that had yet befallen him 404
XCIII. Wherein is given an account of the Knight of the White
Moon; with other matters 406
XCIV. How Don Quixote resolved to turn shepherd, and lead a rural
life for the year's time he was obliged not to bear arms;
with other passages truly good and diverting 410
XCV. Of the ominous accidents that crossed Don Quixote as he
entered his village; with other transactions that illustrate and
adorn this memorable history 417
XCVI. How Don Quixote fell sick, made his last will, and died 420
Preface.
When we reflect upon the great celebrity of the "Life, Exploits, and
Adventures of that ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote de la Mancha," and
how his name has become quite proverbial amongst us, it seems strange
that so little should be known concerning the great man to whose
imagination we are indebted for so amusing and instructive a tale. We
cannot better introduce our present edition than by a short sketch of
his life, adding a few remarks on the work itself and the present
adapted reprint of it.
The obscurity we have alluded to is one which Cervantes shares with
many others, some of them the most illustrious authors which the world
ever produced. Homer, Hesiod,--names with which the mouths of men have
been familiar for centuries,--how little is now known of them! And not
only so, but how little was known of them even by those who lived
comparatively close upon their own time! How scattered and
unsatisfactory are the few particulars which we have of the life of
our own poet William Shakspere!
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was born at Alcala de Henares, a town of
New Castile, famous for its University, founded by Cardinal Ximenes.
He was of gentle birth, both on his father's and mother's side.
Rodrigo de Cervantes, his father, was descended from an ancient family
of Galicia, of which several branches were settled in some of the
principal cities of Spain. His mother's name was Leonora de
Cort[=e]nas. We find by the parish register of Santa Maria la Mayor,
at Alcala de Henares, that Miguel was baptised in that church on
Sunday, the 9th of October, 1547; in which year we may conclude,
therefore, that he was born. The discovery of this baptismal register
set at rest a dispute which had for some time been going on between
_seven_ different cities, each of which claimed the honour of being
the native place of our author: these were, besides the one already
mentioned, Seville, Madrid, Esquivias, Toledo, Lucena, and Alcazar de
San Juan. In this respect we cannot avoid drawing a comparison between
the fame of Cervantes and the prince of poets, Homer.
From a child he discovered a great liking for books, which no doubt
determined his parents, whose fortune, notwithstanding their good
family, was any thing but affluent, to educate him for one of the
learned professions, by which alone at that time there was any chance
of getting wealth. Miguel, however, did not take to the strict studies
proposed to him: not that he was idle; his days were spent in reading
books of amusement, such as novels, romances, and poems. It was of the
materials afforded by such a pursuit that his fame was afterwards
built.
Cervantes continued at Madrid till he was in his twenty-first year,
during which time he remained with his learned tutor Juan Lopez de
Hoyos. He seems to have been a great favourite with him; for, in a
collection of "Luctus," published by Juan on the death of the Queen,
we find an elegy and a ballad contributed by the editor's "dear and
beloved disciple Miguel de Cervantes." Under the same editorial care
Cervantes himself tells us, in his _Viage de Parnasso_, that he
published a pastoral poem of some length, called 'Filena,' besides
several ballads, sonnets, canzonets, and other small poems.
Notwithstanding the comparative insignificance of these productions,
they probably excited some little attention; for it appears not
unlikely that it was to them that Cervantes owed his appointment to an
office, which we find him holding, in 1569, at Rome,--that of
chamberlain to his eminence the Cardinal Julio Aquaviva, an
ecclesiastic of considerable learning. Such an appointment, however,
did not suit the active disposition and romantic turn of one so deeply
read in the adventures of the old knights, the glory of which he
longed to share; from which hope, however, the inactivity and monotony
of a court-life could not but exclude him.
In 1571 there was concluded a famous league between Pope Pius V.,
Philip II. of Spain, and the Venetian Republic, against Selim, the
Grand Turk, who was attacking Cyprus, then belonging to Venice. John
of Austria, natural son of the celebrated Emperor Charles V., and
brother of the king of Spain, was made commander-in-chief of the
allied forces, both naval and military; and under him, as general of
the Papal forces, was appointed Mario Antonio Colonna, Duke of
Paliano. It became fashionable for the young men of the time to enlist
in this expedition; and Cervantes, then about twenty-four years of
age, soon enrolled himself under the standard of the Roman general.
After various success on both sides, in which the operations of the
Christians were not a little hindered by the dissensions of their
commanders, to which the taking of Nicosia by the Turks may be
imputed, the first year's cruise ended with the famous battle of
Lepanto; after which the allied forces retired, and wintered at
Messina.
Cervantes was present at this famous victory, where he was wounded in
the left hand by a blow from a scymitar, or, as some assert, by a
gunshot, so severely, that he was obliged to have it amputated at the
wrist whilst in the hospital at Messina; but the operation was so
unskilfully performed, that he lost the use of the entire arm ever
afterwards. He was not discouraged by this wound, nor induced to give
up his profession as a soldier. Indeed, he seems, from his own words,
to be very proud of the honour which his loss conferred upon him. "My
wound," he says, "was received on the most glorious occasion that any
age, past or present, ever saw, or that the future can ever hope to
see. To those who barely behold them, indeed, my wounds may not seem
honourable; it is by those who know how I came by them that they will
be rightly esteemed. Better is it for a soldier to die in battle than
to save his life by running away. For my part I had rather be again
present, were it possible, in that famous battle, than whole and sound
without sharing ill the glory of it. The scars which a soldier
exhibits in his breast and face are stars to guide others to the haven
of honour and the love of just praise."
The year following the victory of Lepanto, Cervantes still continued
with the same fleet, and took part in several attacks on the coast of
the Morea. At the end of 1572, when the allied forces were disbanded,
Colonna returned to Rome, whither our author probably accompanied him,
since he tells us that he followed his "conquering banners." He
afterwards enlisted in the Neapolitan army of the king of Spain, in
which he remained for three years, though without rising above the
rank of a private soldier; but it must be remembered that, at the time
of which we are now speaking, such was the condition of some of the
noblest men of their country; it was accounted no disgrace for even a
scion of the nobility to fight as a simple halberdier, or musqueteer,
in the service of his prince.
On the 26th of September, 1575, Cervantes embarked on board a galley,
called the 'Sun,' and was sailing from Naples to Spain, when his ship
was attacked by some Moorish corsairs, and both he and all the rest of
the crew were taken prisoners, and carried off to Algiers. When the
Christians were divided amongst their captors, he fell to the lot of
the captain, the famous Arnaute Mami, an Albanian renegade, whose
atrocious cruelties are too disgusting to be mentioned. He seems to
have treated his captive with peculiar harshness, perhaps hoping that
by so doing he might render him the more impatient of his servitude,
and so induce him to pay a higher ransom, which the rank and condition
of his friends in Europe appeared to promise. In this state Cervantes
continued five years. Some have thought that in "the captive's" tale,
related in Don Quixote, we may collect the particulars of his own
fortunes whilst in Africa; but even granting that some of the
incidents may be the same, it is now generally supposed that we shall
be deceived if we regard them as any detailed account of his
captivity. A man of Cervantes' enterprise and abilities was not likely
to endure tamely the hardships of slavery; and we accordingly find
that he was constantly forming schemes for escape. The last of these,
which was the most bold and best contrived of all, failed, because he
had admitted a traitor to a share in his project.
There was at Algiers a Venetian renegade, named Hassan Aga, a friend
of Arnaute Mami; he had risen high in the king's favour, and occupied
an important post in the government of Algiers. We have a description
of this man's ferocious character in Don Quixote, given us by the
Captain de Viedma. Cervantes was often sent by his master as messenger
to this man's house, situated on the sea-shore, at a short distance
from Algiers. One of Hassan's slaves, a native of Navarre, and a
Christian, had the management of the gardens of the villa; and with
him Cervantes soon formed an acquaintance, and succeeded in
persuading him to allow the making of a secret cave under the garden,
which would form a place of concealment for himself and fifteen of his
fellow captives, on whom he could rely. When the cavern was finished,
the adventurers made their escape by night from Algiers, and took up
their quarters in it. Of course an alarm was raised when they were
missing; but, although a most strict search after the fugitives was
made, both by their masters and by Ochali, then despot of Algiers,
here they lay hid for several months, being supplied with food by the
gardener and another Christian slave, named El Dorador.
One of their companions, named Viana, a gentleman of Minorca, had been
left behind them, so that he might bear a more active part in the
escape of the whole party. A sum of money was to be raised for his
ransom, and then he was to go to Europe and return with a ship in
which Cervantes and his friends, including the gardener and El
Dorador, were to embark on an appointed night, and so get back to
their country. Viana obtained his liberty in September 1577, and
having reached Minorca in safety, he easily procured a ship and came
off the coast of Barbary, according to the pre-concerted plan; but
before he could land, he was seen by the Moorish sentry, who raised an
alarm and obliged him to put out to sea again, lest he should by
coming too close attract attention to the cavern. This was a sore
disappointment to Cervantes and his companions, who witnessed it all
from their retreat. Still knowing Viana's courage and constancy, they
had yet hopes of his returning and again endeavouring to get them off.
And this he most probably would have done had it not been for the
treachery at which we hinted above. El Dorador just at this time
thought fit to turn renegade; and of course he could not begin his
infidel career better than by infamously betraying his former friends.
In consequence of his information Hassan Aga surrounded the entrance
to the cave with a sufficient force to make any attempt at resistance
utterly unavailing, and the sixteen poor prisoners were dragged out
and conveyed in chains to Algiers. The former attempts which he made
to escape caused Cervantes to be instantly fixed on as the contriver
and ringleader of this plot; and therefore, whilst the other fifteen
were sent back to their masters to be punished as they thought fit, he
was detained by the king himself, who hoped through him to obtain
further information, and so implicate the other Christians, and
perhaps also some of the renegades. Even had he possessed any such
information, which most likely he did not, Cervantes was certainly the
very last man to give it: notwithstanding various examinations and
threats, he still persisted in asserting that he was the sole
contriver of the plot, till at length, by his firmness, he fairly
exhausted the patience of Ochali. Had Hassan had his way, Cervantes
would have been strangled as an example to all Christians who should
hereafter try to run away from their captivity, and the king himself
was not unwilling to please him in this matter; but then he was not
their property, and Mami, to whom he belonged, would not consent to
lose a slave whom he considered to be worth at least two hundred
crowns. Thus did the avarice of a renegade save the future author of
Don Quixote from being strangled with the bowstring. Some of the
particulars of this affair are given us by Cervantes himself; but
others are collected from Father Haedo, the contemporary author of a
history of Barbary. "Most wonderful thing," says the worthy priest,
"that some of these gentlemen remained shut up in the cavern for five,
six, even for seven months, without even so much as seeing the light
of day; and all the time they were sustained only by Miguel de
Cervantes, and that too at the great and continual risk of his own
life; no less than four times did he incur the nearest danger of being
burnt alive, impaled, or strangled, on account of the bold things
which he dared in hopes of bestowing liberty upon many. Had his
fortune corresponded to his spirit, skill, and industry, Algiers might
at this day have been in the possession of the Christians, for his
designs aspired to no less lofty a consummation. In the end, the whole
affair was treacherously discovered; and the gardener, after being
tortured and picketed, perished miserably. But, in truth, of the
things which happened in that cave during the seven months that it was
inhabited by these Christians, and altogether of the captivity and
various enterprises of Miguel de Cervantes, a particular history might
easily be formed. Hassan Aga was wont to say that, '_could he but be
sure of that handless Spaniard_, he should consider captives, barks,
and the whole city of Algiers in perfect safety.'"
And Ochali seems to have been of the same opinion; for he did not
consider it safe to leave so dangerous a character as Cervantes in
private hands, and so we accordingly find that he himself bought him
of Mami, and then kept him closely confined in a dungeon in his own
palace, with the utmost cruelty. It is probable, however, that the
extreme hardship of Cervantes' case did really contribute to his
liberation. He found means of applying to Spain for his redemption;
and in consequence his mother and sister (the former of whom had now
become a widow, and the latter, Donna Andrea de Cervantes, was married
to a Florentine gentleman named Ambrosio) raised the sum of two
hundred and fifty crowns, to which a friend of the family, one
Francisco Caramambel, contributed fifty more. This sum was paid into
the hands of Father Juan Gil and Father Antonio de la Vella
Trinitarios, brethren of the 'Society for the Redemption of
Slaves,'[1] who immediately set to work to ransom Cervantes. His case
was, however, a hard one; for the king asked a thousand crowns for his
freedom; and the negotiation on this head caused a long delay, but was
at last brought to an issue by the abatement of the ransom to the sum
of five hundred crowns; the two hundred still wanting were made up by
the good fathers, the king threatening that if the bargain were not
concluded, Cervantes should be carried off to Constantinople; and he
was actually on board the galley for that purpose. So by borrowing
some part of the required amount, and by taking the remainder from
what was originally intrusted for the ransoming of other slaves, these
worthy men procured our author his liberty, and restored him to Spain
in the spring of 1581.
[1] Societies of this description, though not so common as in Spain,
existed also in other countries. In England, since the Reformation,
money bequeathed for this purpose was placed in the hands of some of
the large London companies or guilds. Since the destruction of
Algiers, by Lord Exmouth, and still later since the abolition of that
piratical kingdom by the French, such charitable bequests, having
become useless for their original purpose, have in some instances been
devoted to the promotion of education by a decree of Chancery. This is
the case with a large sum, usually known as 'Betton's gift,' in the
trusteeship of the Ironmongers' Company.
On his return to his native land the prospects of Cervantes were not
very flattering. He was now thirty-four years of age, and had spent
the best portion of his life without making any approach towards
eminence or even towards acquiring the means of subsistence; his
adventures, enterprises, and sufferings had, indeed, furnished him
with a stock from which in after years his powerful mind drew largely
in his writings; but since he did not at first devote himself to
literary pursuits, at least not to those of an author, they could not
afford him much consolation; and as to a military career, his wound
and long captivity seemed to exclude him from all hope in that
quarter. His family was poor, their scanty means having suffered from
the sum raised for his ransom; and his connexions and friends were
powerless to procure him any appointment at the court. He went to live
at Madrid, where his mother and sister then resided, and there once
more betook himself to the pursuit of his younger days. He shut
himself up, and eagerly employed his time in reading every kind of
books; Latin, Spanish, and Italian authors--all served to contribute
to his various erudition.
Three whole years were thus spent; till at length he turned his
reading to some account, by publishing, in 1584, a pastoral novel
entitled _Galataea_. Some authors, amongst whom is Pellicer, are
inclined to think that dramatic composition was the first in which he
appeared before the public; but such an opinion has, by competent
judges, been now abandoned. Galataea, which is interspersed with songs
and verses, is a work of considerable merit, quite sufficient, indeed,
though of course inferior to Don Quixote, to have gained for its
author a high standing amongst Spanish writers; though in it we
discern nothing of that peculiar style which has made Cervantes one of
the most remarkable writers that ever lived,--that insight into human
character, and that vein of humour with which he exposes and satirises
its failings. It being so full of short metrical effusions would
almost incline us to believe that it was written for the purpose of
embodying the varied contents of a sort of poetical commonplace-book;
some of which had, perhaps, been written when he was a youth under the
tuition of his learned preceptor Juan Lopez de Hoyos; others may have
been the pencillings of the weary hours of his long captivity in
Africa. As a specimen of his power in the Spanish language it is quite
worthy of him who in after years immortalised that tongue by the
romance of Don Quixote. It had been better for Cervantes had he gone
on in this sort of fictitious composition, instead of betaking himself
to the drama, in which he had very formidable rivals, and for which,
as was afterwards proved, his talents were less adapted.
On the 12th of December in the same year that his Galataea was
published, Cervantes married, at Esquivias, a young lady who was of
one of the first families of that place, and whose charms had
furnished the chief subject of his amatory poems; she was named Donna
Catalina de Salazar y Palacios y Vozmediano. Her fortune was but
small, and only served to keep Cervantes for some few months in
idleness; when his difficulties began to harass him again, and found
him as a married man less able to meet them. He then betook himself to
the drama, at which he laboured for several years, though with very
indifferent success. He wrote, in all, it is said thirty comedies; but
of these only eight remain, judging from the merits of which, we do
not seem to have sustained any great loss in the others not having
reached us.
It may appear strange at first that one who possessed such a wonderful
power of description and delineation of character as did Cervantes,
should not have been more successful in dramatic writing; but,
whatever may be the cause, certain it is that his case does not stand
alone. Men who have manifested the very highest abilities as
romance-writers, have, if not entirely failed, at least not been
remarkably successful, as composers of the drama; and of our own time,
who so great a delineator of character, or so happy in his incidents,
or so stirring in his plots, as the immortal Author of Waverley? Yet
the few specimens of dramatic composition which he has left us, only
serve to shew that, when _Waverley_, _Guy Mannering_, _Ivanhoe_, and
the rest of his romances are the delight of succeeding generations,
_Halidon Hill_ and the _House of Aspen_ will, with the _Numancia
Vengada_ of the author of Don Quixote, be buried in comparative
oblivion.
In 1588 Cervantes left Madrid, and settled at Seville, where, as he
himself tells us, "he found something better to do than writing
comedies." This "something better" was probably an appointment in some
mercantile business; for we know that one of the principal branches of
his family were very opulent merchants at Seville at that time, and
through them he might obtain some means of subsistence less precarious
than that which depended upon selling his comedies for a few "reals."
Besides, two of the Cervantes-Saavedra of Seville were themselves
amateur poets, and likely therefore to regard the more favourably
their poor relation, Miguel of Alcala de Henares, to whom they would
gladly intrust the management of some part of their mercantile
affairs. The change, however, of life did not prevent Cervantes from
still cultivating his old passion for literature; and we accordingly
find his name as one of the prize-bearers for a series of poems which
the Dominicans of Saragoza, in 1595, proposed to be written in praise
of St. Hyacinthus; one of the prizes was adjudged to "Miguel Cervantes
Saavedra of Seville."
In 1596 we find two short poetical pieces of Cervantes written upon
the occasion of the gentlemen of Seville having taken arms, and
prepared to deliver themselves and the city of Cadiz from the power of
the English, who, under the famous Earl of Essex, had made a descent
upon the Spanish coast, and destroyed the shipping intended for a
second armada for the invasion of England. In 1598 Philip II. died;
and Cervantes wrote a sonnet, which he then considered the best of his
literary productions, upon a majestic tomb, of enormous height, to
celebrate the funeral of that monarch. On the day that Philip was
buried, a serious quarrel happened between the civil and
ecclesiastical authorities of Seville; and Cervantes was mixed up in
it, and was in some trouble for having dared to manifest his
disapprobation by hissing at some part of their proceedings, but we
are not told what.
In 1599 Cervantes went to Toledo, which is remarkable as being the
place where he pretended to discover the original manuscript of Don
Quixote, by the Arabian Cid Hamet Benengeli. It was about this time,
too, that he resided in La Mancha, where he projected and executed
part, at least, of his immortal romance of Don Quixote, and where he
also laid the scene of that "ingenious gentleman's" adventures. It
seems likely that, whatever may have been Cervantes' employment at
Seville, it involved frequent travelling; and this may account for the
very accurate knowledge which he displays of the different districts
which he describes in his tale; for it is certain that the earlier
part of his life could have afforded him no means of acquiring such
information. Some have thought also that he was occasionally employed
on government business, and that it was whilst on some commission of
this sort that he was ill-treated by the people of La Mancha, and
thrown into prison by them at Argasamilla. Whatever may have been the
cause of his imprisonment, he himself tells us in the prologue to Don
Quixote, that the first part of that work was composed in a jail.
But for fifteen years of Cervantes' life, from 1588 to 1603, we know
but very little of his pursuits; the notices we have of him during
that time are very few and unsatisfactory; and this is the more to be
regretted because it certainly was then that his great work was
conceived, and in part executed. Soon after the accession of Philip
the Third, he removed from Seville to Valladolid, probably for the
sake of being near the court of that monarch, who, though remarkable
for his indolence, yet professed himself the patron of letters. It was
whilst living here that the first part of Don Quixote was published,
but not at Valladolid; it appeared at Madrid, either at the end of
1604, or, at the latest, in 1605.
The records of the magistracy of Valladolid afford us some curious
particulars of our author's mode of life about the time of the
publication of Don Quixote. He was brought before the court of
justice, on suspicion of having been concerned in a nightly brawl and
murder, though he really had no share in it. A Spanish gentleman,
named Don Gaspar Garibay, was stabbed about midnight near the house of
Cervantes. When the alarm was raised, he was amongst the first to run
out and proffer every assistance in his power to the wounded man. The
neighbourhood was not very respectable, and this gave rise to our
author's subsequent trouble in the matter; for it was suspected that
the ladies of his household were, from the place where they lived,
persons of bad reputation, and that he himself had, in some shameful
affray, dealt the murderous blow with his own hand. He and all his
family were, in consequence, directly arrested, and only got at
liberty after undergoing a very minute and rigid examination. The
records of the court tell us that Cervantes asserted that he was
residing at Valladolid for purposes of business; that, by reason of
his literary pursuits and reputation, he was frequently honoured by
visits from gentlemen of the royal household and learned men of the
university; and, moreover, that he was living in great poverty; for we
are told that he, his wife, and his two sisters, one of whom was a
nun, and his niece, were living in a scanty and mean lodging on the
fourth floor of a poor-looking house, and amongst them all had only
one maid-servant. He stated his age to be upwards of fifty, though we
know that, if born in 1547, he must in fact have nearly, or quite
completed his fifty-seventh year at this time. In such obscurity,
then, was the immortal author of Don Quixote living at the time of its
publication.
The First Part of this famous romance was dedicated to Don Alonzo
Lopez de Zuniga, Duke of Bexar or Bejar, who at this time affected the
character of a Mecaenas; whose conduct, however, towards Cervantes was
not marked by a generosity suited to his rank, nor according to his
profession, nor at all corresponding to the merits and wants of the
author. But the book needed no patron; it must make its own way, and
it did so. It was read immediately in court and city, by old and
young, learned and unlearned, and by all with equal delight; "it went
forth with the universal applause of all nations." Four editions (and
in the seventeenth century, when so few persons comparatively could
read, that was equivalent to more than double the number at the
present time)--four editions were published and sold in one year.
The profits from the sale of Don Quixote must have been very
considerable; and they, together with the remains of his paternal
estates, and the pensions from the count and the cardinal, enabled
Cervantes to live in ease and comfort. Ten years elapsed before he
sent any new work to the press; which time was passed in study, and in
attending to his pecuniary affairs. Though Madrid was now his fixed
abode, we often find him at Esquivias, where he probably went to enjoy
the quiet and repose of the village, and to look after the property
which he there possessed as his wife's dowry.
In 1613 he published his twelve _Novelas Exemplares_, or 'Exemplary
Novels,' with a dedication to his patron the Count de Lemos. He called
them "exemplary," because, as he tells us, his other novels had been
censured as more satirical than exemplary; which fault he determined
to amend in these; and therefore each of them contains interwoven in
it some error to be avoided, or some virtue to be practised. He
asserts that they were entirely his own invention, not borrowed or
copied from any other works of the same sort, nor translated from any
other language, as was the case with most of the novels which his
countrymen had published hitherto. But, notwithstanding this, we
cannot fail to remark a strong resemblance in them to the tales of
Boccaccio; still they are most excellent in their way, and have always
been favourites with the Spanish youth for their interest and pure
morality, and their ease and manliness of style. The titles of these
novels are, _The Little Gipsey_, _The Generous Lover_, _Rinconete and
Cortadillo_, _The Spanish-English Lady_, _The Glass Doctor_, _The
Force of Blood_, _The Jealous Estremaduran_, _The Illustrious
Servant-Maid_, _The Two Damsels_, _The Lady Cornelia Bentivoglio_,
_The Deceitful Marriage_, and _The Dialogue of the Dogs_. They have
all been translated into English, and are probably not unknown to some
of our readers.
The next year Cervantes published another small work, entitled the
_Viage de Parnasso_, or 'A Journey to Parnassus,' which is a playful
satire upon the Spanish poets, after the manner of Caesar Caporali's
upon the Italian poets under a similar title. It is a good picture of
the Spanish literature of his day, and one of the most powerful of his
poetical works. It is full of satire, though not ill-natured, and
there was no man of genius of the time who would complain of being too
harshly treated in it. Cervantes introduces himself as the oldest and
poorest of all the poetical fraternity, "the naked Adam of Spanish
poets." The plot of the poem is as follows:--Apollo wishes to rid
Parnassus of the bad poets, and to that end he calls together all the
others by a message through Mercury. When all assembled, he leads them
into a rich garden of Parnassus, and assigns to each the place which
corresponds to his merits. Poor Cervantes alone does not obtain this
distinction, and remains without being noticed in the presence of the
rest, before whom all the works he has ever published are displayed.
In vain does he urge his love for literature, and the troubles which
he had endured for its sake; no seat can he get. At last Apollo, in
compassion upon him, advises him to fold up his cloak, and to make
that his seat; but, alas, so poor is he that he does not possess such
a thing, and so he is obliged to remain standing in spite of his age,
his talents, and the opinion of many who know and confess the honour
and position which is his due. The vessel in which this 'Journey to
Parnassus' is performed is described in a way quite worthy of
Cervantes: "From topmast to keel it was all of verse; not one foot of
prose was there in it. The airy railings which fenced the deck were
all of double-rhymes. Ballads, an impudent but necessary race,
occupied the rowing-benches; and rightly, for there is nothing to
which they may not be turned. The poop was grand and gay, but somewhat
strange in its style, being stuck all over with sonnets of the richest
workmanship. The stroke-oars on either side were pulled by two
vigorous triplets, which regulated the motion of the vessel in a way
both easy and powerful. The gangway was one long and most melancholy
elegy, from which tears were continually dropping."
The publication of a shameful imitation, pretending to be a Second
Part of the Adventures of Don Quixote accelerated the production of
Cervantes' own Second Part; which accordingly made its appearance at
the beginning of 1615. Contrary to common experience, this Second Part
was received, and deservedly, with as great applause as was the First
Part ten years before.
Cervantes had now but a few more months to live; and it must, in his
declining years, have been a great consolation to find that the
efforts of his genius were still appreciated by his countrymen; not to
mention the relief from pecuniary embarrassments which the profits of
the sale must have afforded him. Cervantes was now at the height to
which his ambition had all along aimed; he had no rival; for Lope de
Vega was dead, and the literary kingdom of Spain was all his own. He
was courted by the great; no strangers came to Madrid without making
the writer of Don Quixote the first object of their inquiry; he
reposed in honour, free from all calumny, in the bosom of his family.
This same year he published eight comedies, and the same number of
interludes; two only in verse, the rest in prose. It does not seem
likely that these were written at this time; they must have been the
works of his earlier years; but, like his novels, corrected and given
to the public when his judgment was more mature. Several of them had,
no doubt, been performed on the stage many years before, and remained
with Cervantes in manuscript. The dissertation which he prefixed to
them is full of interest, and is very curious and valuable, since it
contains the only account we have of the early history of the Spanish
drama.
In 1616, he completed and prepared for the press a romance entitled
_Persiles and Sigismunda_, of a grave character, written in imitation
of the _Ethiopics_ of Heliodorus; it was the work of many years, and
is accounted by the Spaniards one of the purest specimens of Castilian
writing. He finished it just before his death, but never lived to see
it published. The dedication and prologue of Persiles and Sigismunda
are very affecting; they are the voice of a dying man speaking to us
of his approaching dissolution.
From the nature of his complaint, Cervantes retained his mental
faculties to the very last, and so was able to be the historian of his
latter days. At the end of the preface to _Persiles_, he tells us that
he had gone for a few days to Esquivias, in hopes that country air
might be beneficial to him. On his return to Madrid, he was
accompanied by his friends, when a young student on horseback overtook
them, riding very hard to do so, and complaining in consequence of the
rapid pace at which they were going. One of the three made answer that
it was no fault of theirs, but that the horse of Miguel de Cervantes
was to be blamed, whose trot was none of the slowest. Scarcely had the
name been pronounced, when the young man dismounted; and touching the
border of Cervantes' left sleeve, exclaimed, "Yes, yes, it is indeed
the maimed perfection, the all-famous, the delightful writer, the joy
and darling of the Muses." This salutation was returned with
Cervantes' natural modesty; and the worthy student performed the rest
of the journey with him and his friends. "We drew up a little," says
Cervantes, "and rode on at a measured pace; and whilst we rode, we
happened to talk of my illness. The good student soon knocked away
all my hopes, and let me know my doom, by telling me that it was a
dropsy that I had got: the thirst attending which, not all the waters
of the ocean, though it were not salt, could suffice to quench.
'Therefore, Senor Cervantes,' said he, 'you must drink nothing at all,
but forget not to eat, and to eat plentifully; that alone will recover
you without any physic.' 'Others have told me the same,' answered I;
'but I can no more forbear drinking, than if I had been born to
nothing else. My life is fast drawing to a close; and from the state
of my pulse, I think I can scarcely outlive Sunday next at the utmost;
so that I hardly think I shall profit by the acquaintance so
fortunately made. But adieu, my merry friends all; for I am going to
die; and I hope to see you again ere long in the next world as happy
as hearts can desire.' With that, we found ourselves at the bridge of
Toledo, by which we entered the city; and the student took leave of
us, having to go round by the bridge of Segovia."
This is all that we know of the last sickness of Cervantes: it was
dropsy, and this dropsy, according to his own prediction to the
student, increased so rapidly, that a few days after, on the 18th of
April, 1616, he was considered to be past recovery, and it was thought
advisable for him to receive the last sacrament of extreme unction,
which he accordingly did with all the devotion of a pious Catholic.
He died on the 23d day of April, 1616, in the sixty-ninth year of his
age; and was buried in the habit of the Franciscans, whose order he
had entered some time previous to his decease. It is a coincidence
worth remembering, that _Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra_ terminated his
mortal course in Spain on the very same day that _William Shakspere_
died in England.
As regards style of composition, Cervantes is without a rival in the
Spanish language. For the purity of his writing, he is even to this
day acknowledged, not only to be first, but to have no one who can
come near enough to be called second to him. But this is not his
greatest praise. He must ever be remembered as the originator of a
kind of writing, which the greatest of men since his time have thought
it an honour, of whatever country they may have been, to imitate. All
modern romance-writers, and novel-writers (and what a mighty host are
they!) must be content to be accounted the followers of Miguel de
Cervantes.
With regard to _Don Quixote_, it need hardly be said that its object is
satire upon the books of knight-errantry, which were so much used in the
time of Cervantes, and especially by the Spanish. He conceived that these
books were likely to give his countrymen false ideas of the world; to
fill them all, but especially the young, with fanciful notions of life,
and so make them unfit to meet its real difficulties and hardships. In
order to exhibit the absurdity of such works (it must be remembered too,
that the more famous books of knighthood had given rise to a host of
spurious imitations, with all their faults and none of their beauties),
the author of Don Quixote represents a worthy gentleman with his head
turned by such reading, and then sallying forth and endeavouring to act
in this plain matter-of-fact world (where there are windmills, and not
giants--inns, and not castles--good honest hosts and hostesses, and not
lords and ladies--chambermaids, and not peerless beauties--estates to be
got by hard labour, and not islands to be given away to one's dependants
as if by enchantment), endeavouring to act, we say, as if all that was
said in _Amadis de Gaul_, and _Palmerin of England_, and _Olivante de
Laura_, were really true. The absurdities into which the poor gentleman's
madness constantly hurries him, the stern and bitter satire which is
conveyed in these against the books which caused them all, did more
towards putting down the extravagances of knight-errantry than many
volumes of the bitterest invective. We of this present day cannot be
really alive to all the great genius displayed in Don Quixote. The books
which it satirises are now almost unknown; many who have heard of Amadis
de Gaul have never read it, and still less have they read all the lineage
of the Amadis. Besides, in some of the first of the chivalrous romances,
such as Palmerin of England, the _Morte d'Arthur_, and others, there was
undoubtedly very much talent and beauty of sentiment: and it was as such
that Southey thought it right to translate them and present them to the
English public some years ago; and deeply indebted are we all to him for
his labours, which revived among us somewhat of the taste for the old and
stately prose of the ancient romances--a taste which in our day has given
rise to those beautiful editions in English of the tales of De la Motte
Fouque. But we must ever remember that it was not for the purpose of
ridiculing those and similar books that Cervantes wrote his
"history"--one so keenly alive to the beauty of the poetry of the
mediaeval writing as he was, never could have intended such a thing: it
was to exterminate the race of miserable imitators, who, at his time,
deluged Europe with sickening caricatures of the old romance. It has even
been thought that he had intended another course in order to cure the
disease, namely, that of himself composing a model romance in the style
of Amadis, which, from its excellence, would make manifest the follies of
men who had endeavoured to imitate that almost inimitable work. But the
disease was past cure; the limb was obliged to be amputated; books of
knight-errantry could not be reformed, he thought; and so rather than let
them continue their mischief in their present shape, they must be quite
destroyed; and this the satire of Don Quixote was by its author
considered the most proper means of effecting.
This was indeed a daring remedy; and, as may be supposed, by some it
has been thought that Cervantes, in lopping off an excrescence, did
also destroy a healthy limb,--that, in destroying knight-errantry, he
destroyed also the holy spirit of self-devotion and heroism. The Count
Segur, we are told by an ingenious writer of the present time,[2] who
joins the Count in his opinion, laments that the fine spirit of
chivalry should have lost its empire, and that the romance of Don
Quixote, by its success and its philosophy, concealed under an
attractive fiction, should have completed the ruin by fixing ridicule
even upon its memory--a sentence indeed full of error; for real
philosophy needs not to be concealed to be attractive. And Sir William
Temple quotes the saying of a worthy Spaniard, who told him "that the
History of Don Quixote had ruined the Spanish monarchy; for since that
time men had grown ashamed of honour and love, and only thought of
pursuing their fortune and satisfying their lust."
[2] Kenelm Digby, Esq., in his beautiful book entitled _Godefridus_,
one of the volumes of the _Broad Stone of Honour_.
But surely such censure is misdirected--surely the downfall of Spain
may be traced to other causes. It is not the spirit of heroism, or of
Christian self-devotion, which Cervantes would put down. His manly
writing can never be accused of that: misfortune had taught him too
well in his own earlier days how to appreciate such a virtue. In
nothing is his consummate skill perceived more than in the way in
which he prevents us from confounding the follies of the
knights-errant, and of the debased books of romance, with the generous
heart and actions of the true Christian gentleman. In spite of all his
hallucination, who can help respecting Don Quixote himself? We laugh,
indeed, at the ludicrous situations into which his madness is for ever
getting him; but we must reverence the good Christian cavalier who,
amidst all, never thinks less of any thing than of himself and of his
own interest. What is his character? It is that of one possessing
virtue, imagination, genius, kind feeling,--all that can distinguish
an elevated soul, and an affectionate heart. He is brave, faithful,
loyal, always keeping his word; he contends only for virtue and glory.
Does he wish for kingdoms? it is only that he may give them to his
good squire Sancho Panza. He is a constant lover, a humane warrior, an
affectionate master, an accomplished gentleman. It is not, then, by
describing such a man that Cervantes desired to ridicule real heroism;
surely not: he would only shew that, even with all these good
qualities, if they were misdirected or spoiled by vain imaginations,
the most noble could only become ridiculous. He would teach us, that
this is a world of _action_, and not of _fancy_; that it will not do
for us to go out of ourselves and out of the world, and lead an ideal
life: our duties are around us and within us; and we need not leave
our own homes in order to seek adventures wherein those duties may be
acceptably performed. He perceived that by knight-errantry and
romances some of the holiest aspirations of the human heart were,
according to the adage, which affirms that "there is but one step from
the sublime to the ridiculous," by over-description and fulsome
language, in danger of being exposed to ridicule, and so of being
crushed; and he resolved, by excess of satire, to put a stop at once
to such a danger,--to crush those books which were daily destroying
that which he held most dear--the true spirit of chivalry, the true
devotion of the Christian gentleman. "When the light of chivalry was
expiring, Cervantes put his extinguisher upon it, and drove away the
moths that alone still fluttered around it. He loved chivalry too well
to be patient when he saw it parodied and burlesqued; and he perceived
that the best way of preserving it from shame was, to throw over it
the sanctity of death."[3]
[3] Vide _Guesses at Truth_.
With respect to the present edition, little need be said beyond what
the title-page itself implies. With what degree of judgment the
"cumbrous matter" has been removed, must be left to the public to
determine. The Editor may, however, say, that the task which he at
first undertook with some trepidation, gradually assumed an easier and
more pleasant aspect; and he may add, that the result has been such as
to satisfy himself of the success of the experiment. He trusts that he
has placed in the hands of the mass of our reading population, and
especially of the youth of England, an edition of Cervantes' immortal
work, in a convenient, but yet not too condensed form--retaining all
the point, humour, and pathos of the original, without any of the
prolixity, or the improprieties of expression, which have heretofore
disfigured it. The judgment passed upon one of the books in our hero's
library by his inquisitorial friends may well be applied to his own
work: "Had there been less of it, it would have been more esteemed.
'Tis fit the book should be pruned and cleared of some inferior things
that encumber and deform it: keep it, however," &c.--(_Page 23._)
It only remains to add, that the excellent translation of Motteux has
been principally adhered to in the present edition.
_London, December 1st, 1846._
NOTES.
_The holy brotherhood._--Most readers would suppose at first sight
that the Inquisition is meant by this term, which occurs so often in
the work; it is not so, however. The "holy brotherhood" alluded to was
simply an association for the prevention of robberies and murders in
the less frequented parts of Spain.
_Mambrino's helmet._--Orlando Furioso must be referred to for the
history of this enchanted and invulnerable headpiece, which is several
times alluded to in Don Quixote.
The Life and Achievements
OF
DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA.
CHAPTER I.
_The quality and way of living of Don Quixote._
In a certain village in La Mancha, in the kingdom of Arragon, of which
I cannot remember the name, there lived not long ago one of those
old-fashioned gentlemen, who are never without a lance upon a rack, an
old target, a lean horse, and a greyhound. His diet consisted more of
beef than mutton; and, with minced meat on most nights, lentiles on
Fridays, and a pigeon extraordinary on Sundays, he consumed three
quarters of his revenue; the rest was laid out in a plush coat, velvet
breeches, with slippers of the same, for holydays; and a suit of the
very best homespun cloth, which he bestowed on himself for
working-days. His whole family was a housekeeper something turned of
forty, a niece not twenty, and a man that served him in the house and
in the field, and could saddle a horse, and handle the pruning-hook.
The master himself was nigh fifty years of age, of a hale and strong
complexion, lean-bodied and thin-faced, an early riser, and a lover of
hunting. Some say his sirname was Quixada, or Quesada (for authors
differ in this particular); however, we may reasonably conjecture, he
was called Quixada (_i.e._ lantern-jaws), though this concerns us but
little, provided we keep strictly to the truth in every point of this
history.
Be it known, then, that when our gentleman had nothing to do (which
was almost all the year round), he passed his time in reading books of
knight-errantry, which he did with that application and delight, that
at last he in a manner wholly left off his country sports, and even
the care of his estate; nay, he grew so strangely enamoured of these
amusements, that he sold many acres of land to purchase books of that
kind, by which means he collected as many of them as he could; but
none pleased him like the works of the famous Feliciano de Sylva; for
the brilliancy of his prose, and those intricate expressions with
which it is interlaced seemed to him so many pearls of eloquence,
especially when he came to read the love-addresses and challenges;
many of them in this extraordinary style. "The reason of your
unreasonable usage of my reason, does so enfeeble my reason, that I
have reason to expostulate with your beauty." And this, "The sublime
heavens, which with your divinity divinely fortify you with the stars,
and fix you the deserver of the desert that is deserved by your
grandeur." These, and such-like rhapsodies, strangely puzzled the poor
gentleman's understanding, while he was racking his brain to unravel
their meaning, which Aristotle himself could never have found, though
he should have been raised from the dead for that very purpose.
He did not so well like those dreadful wounds which Don Belianis gave
and received; for he considered that all the art of surgery could
never secure his face and body from being strangely disfigured with
scars. However, he highly commended the author for concluding his book
with a promise to finish that unfinishable adventure; and many times
he had a desire to put pen to paper, and faithfully and literally
finish it himself; which he had certainly done, and doubtless with
good success, had not his thoughts been wholly engrossed in much more
important designs.
He would often dispute with the curate of the parish, a man of
learning, that had taken his degrees at Giguenza, as to which was the
better knight, Palmerin of England, or Amadis de Gaul; but Master
Nicholas, the barber of the same town, would say, that none of them
could compare with the Knight of the Sun; and that if any one came
near him, it was certainly Don Galaor, the brother of Amadis de Gaul;
for he was a man of a most commodious temper, neither was he so
finical, nor such a whining lover, as his brother; and as for courage,
he was not a jot behind him.
In fine, he gave himself up so wholly to the reading of romances, that
at night he would pore on until it was day, and would read on all day
until it was night; and thus a world of extraordinary notions, picked
out of his books, crowded into his imagination; now his head was full
of nothing but enchantments, quarrels, battles, challenges, wounds,
complaints, love-passages, torments, and abundance of absurd
impossibilities; insomuch that all the fables and fantastical tales
which he read seemed to him now as true as the most authentic
histories. He would say, that the Cid Ruydiaz was a very brave knight,
but not worthy to stand in competition with the Knight of the Burning
Sword, who, with a single back-stroke had cut in sunder two fierce
and mighty giants. He liked yet better Bernardo del Carpio, who, at
Roncesvalles, deprived of life the enchanted Orlando, having lifted
him from the ground, and choked him in the air, as Hercules did
Antaeus, the son of the Earth.
As for the giant Morgante, he always spoke very civil things of him;
for among that monstrous brood, who were ever intolerably proud and
insolent, he alone behaved himself like a civil and well-bred person.
But of all men in the world he admired Rinaldo of Montalban, and
particularly his carrying away the idol of Mahomet, which was all
massy gold, as the history says; while he so hated that traitor
Galalon, that for the pleasure of kicking him handsomely, he would
have given up his housekeeper, nay and his niece into the bargain.
Having thus confused his understanding, he unluckily stumbled upon the
oddest fancy that ever entered into a madman's brain; for now he
thought it convenient and necessary, as well for the increase of his
own honour, as the service of the public, to turn knight-errant, and
roam through the whole world, armed cap-a-pie, and mounted on his
steed, in quest of adventures; that thus imitating those
knight-errants of whom he had read, and following their course of
life, redressing all manner of grievances, and exposing himself to
danger on all occasions, at last, after a happy conclusion of his
enterprises, he might purchase everlasting honour and renown.
The first thing he did was to scour a suit of armour that had belonged
to his great grandfather, and had lain time out of mind carelessly
rusting in a corner; but when he had cleaned and repaired it as well
as he could, he perceived there was a material piece wanting; for,
instead of a complete helmet, there was only a single head-piece.
However, his industry supplied that defect; for with some pasteboard
he made a kind of half-beaver, or vizor, which, being fitted to the
head-piece, made it look like an entire helmet. Then, to know whether
it were cutlass-proof, he drew his sword, and tried its edge upon the
pasteboard vizor; but with the very first stroke he unluckily undid in
a moment what he had been a whole week in doing. He did not like its
being broke with so much ease, and therefore, to secure it from the
like accident, he made it a-new, and fenced it with thin plates of
iron, which he fixed on the inside of it so artificially, that at last
he had reason to be satisfied with the solidity of the work; and so,
without any farther experiment, he resolved it should pass to all
intents and purposes for a full and sufficient helmet.
The next moment he went to view his horse, whose bones stuck out like
the corners of a Spanish real, being a worse jade than Gonela's, _qui
tantum pellis etossa fuit_; however, his master thought that neither
Alexander's Bucephalus nor the Cid's Babieca could be compared with
him. He was four days considering what name to give him; for, as he
argued with himself, there was no reason that a horse bestrid by so
famous a knight, and withal so excellent in himself, should not be
distinguished by a particular name; so, after many names which he
devised, rejected, changed, liked, disliked, and pitched upon again,
he concluded to call him Rozinante.
Having thus given his horse a name, he thought of choosing one for
himself; and having seriously pondered on the matter eight whole days
more, at last he determined to call himself Don Quixote. Whence the
author of this history draws this inference, that his right name was
Quixada, and not Quesada, as others obstinately pretend. And
observing, that the valiant Amadis, not satisfied with the bare
appellation of Amadis, added to it the name of his country, that it
might grow more famous by his exploits, and so styled himself Amadis
de Gaul; so he, like a true lover of his native soil, resolved to call
himself Don Quixote de la Mancha; which addition, to his thinking,
denoted very plainly his parentage and country, and consequently would
fix a lasting honour on that part of the world.
And now, his armour being scoured, his head-piece improved to a
helmet, his horse and himself new-named, he perceived he wanted
nothing but a lady, on whom he might bestow the empire of his heart;
for he was sensible that a knight-errant without a mistress was a tree
without either fruit or leaves, and a body without a soul. "Should I,"
said he to himself, "by good or ill fortune, chance to encounter some
giant, as it is common in knight-errantry, and happen to lay him
prostrate on the ground, transfixed with my lance, or cleft in two,
or, in short, overcome him, and have him at my mercy, would it not be
proper to have some lady to whom I may send him as a trophy of my
valour? Then when he comes into her presence, throwing himself at her
feet, he may thus make his humble submission: 'Lady, I am the giant
Caraculiambro, lord of the island of Malindrania, vanquished in single
combat by that never-deservedly-enough-extolled knight-errant Don
Quixote de la Mancha, who has commanded me to cast myself most humbly
at your feet, that it may please your honour to dispose of me
according to your will.'" Near the place where he lived dwelt a
good-looking country girl, for whom he had formerly had a sort of an
inclination, though, it is believed, she never heard of it, nor
regarded it in the least. Her name was Aldonza Lorenzo, and this was
she whom he thought he might entitle to the sovereignty of his heart;
upon which he studied to find her out a new name, that might have some
affinity with her old one, and yet at the same time sound somewhat
like that of a princess, or lady of quality; so at last he resolved to
call her Dulcinea, with the addition of del Toboso, from the place
where she was born; a name, in his opinion, sweet, harmonious, and
dignified, like the others which he had devised.
CHAPTER II.
_Which treats of Don Quixote's first sally._
These preparations being made, he found his designs ripe for action,
and thought it now a crime to deny himself any longer to the injured
world that wanted such a deliverer; the more when he considered what
grievances he was to redress, what wrongs and injuries to remove, what
abuses to correct, and what duties to discharge. So one morning before
day, in the greatest heat of July, without acquainting any one with
his design, with all the secrecy imaginable, he armed himself
cap-a-pie, laced on his ill-contrived helmet, braced on his target,
grasped his lance, mounted Rozinante, and at the private door of his
back-yard sallied out into the fields, wonderfully pleased to see with
how much ease he had succeeded in the beginning of his enterprise. But
he had not gone far ere a terrible thought alarmed him; a thought that
had like to have made him renounce his great undertaking; for now it
came into his mind, that the honour of knighthood had not yet been
conferred upon him, and therefore, according to the laws of chivalry,
he neither could nor ought to appear in arms against any professed
knight; nay, he also considered, that though he were already knighted,
it would become him to wear white armour, and not to adorn his shield
with any device, until he had deserved one by some extraordinary
demonstration of his valour.
These thoughts staggered his resolution; but his frenzy prevailing
more than reason, he resolved to be dubbed a knight by the first he
should meet, after the example of several others, who, as the romances
informed him, had formerly done the like. As for the other difficulty
about wearing white armour, he proposed to overcome it, by scouring
his own at leisure until it should look whiter than ermine. And having
thus dismissed these scruples, he rode calmly on, leaving it to his
horse to go which way he pleased; firmly believing, that in this
consisted the very essence of adventures. And as he thus went on, "no
doubt," said he to himself, "that when the history of my famous
achievements shall be given to the world, the learned author will
begin it in this very manner, when he comes to give an account of this
my setting out: 'Scarce had the ruddy Phoebus begun to spread the
golden tresses of his lovely hair over the vast surface of the earthly
globe, and scarce had those feathered poets of the grove, the pretty
painted birds, tuned their little pipes, to sing their early welcomes
in soft melodious strains to the beautiful Aurora, displaying her rosy
graces to mortal eyes from the gates and balconies of the Manchegan
horizon,--when the renowned knight Don Quixote de la Mancha,
disdaining soft repose, forsook the voluptuous down, and mounting his
famous steed Rozinante, entered the ancient and celebrated plains of
Montiel.'" This was indeed the very road he took; and then proceeding,
"O happy age! O fortunate times!" cried he, "decreed to usher into the
world my famous achievements; achievements worthy to be engraven on
brass, carved on marble, and delineated in some masterpiece of
painting, as monuments of my glory, and examples for posterity! And
thou, venerable sage, wise enchanter, whatever be thy name; thou whom
fate has ordained to be the compiler of this rare history, forget not,
I beseech thee, my trusty Rozinante, the eternal companion of all my
adventures." After this, as if he had been really in love; "O Princess
Dulcinea," cried he, "lady of this captive heart, much sorrow and woe
you have doomed me to in banishing me thus, and imposing on me your
rigorous commands, never to appear before your beauteous face!
Remember, lady, that loyal heart your slave, who for your love submits
to so many miseries." To these extravagant conceits, he added a world
of others, all in imitation, and in the very style of those which the
reading of romances had furnished him with; and all this while he rode
so softly, and the sun's heat increased so fast, and was so violent,
that it would have been sufficient to have melted his brains, had he
had any left.
He travelled almost all that day without meeting any adventure worth
the trouble of relating, which put him into a kind of despair; for he
desired nothing more than to encounter immediately some person on whom
he might try the vigour of his arm.
Towards the evening, he and his horse being heartily tired and almost
famished, Don Quixote looked about him, in hopes to discover some
castle, or at least some shepherd's cottage, there to repose and
refresh himself; and at last near the road which he kept, he espied an
inn, a most welcome sight to his longing eyes. Hastening towards it
with all the speed he could, he got thither just at the close of the
evening. There stood by chance at the inn-door two young female
adventurers, who were going to Seville with some carriers that
happened to take up their lodging there that very evening; and as
whatever our knight-errant saw, thought, or imagined, was all of a
romantic cast, and appeared to him altogether after the manner of his
favourite books, he no sooner saw the inn but he fancied it to be a
castle fenced with four towers, and lofty pinnacles glittering with
silver, together with a deep moat, drawbridge, and all those other
appurtenances peculiar to such kind of places.
When he came near it, he stopped a while at a distance from the gate,
expecting that some dwarf would appear on the battlements, and sound
his trumpet to give notice of the arrival of a knight; but finding
that nobody came, and that Rozinante was for making the best of his
way to the stable, he advanced to the door, at which the innkeeper
immediately appeared. He was a man whose burden of fat inclined him to
peace and quietness, yet when he observed such a strange disguise of
human shape in his old armour and equipage, he could hardly forbear
laughter; but having the fear of such a warlike appearance before his
eyes, he resolved to give him good words, and therefore accosted him
civilly: "Sir Knight," said he, "if your worship be disposed to
alight, you will fail of nothing here but of a bed; as for all other
accommodations, you may be supplied to your mind." Don Quixote
observing the humility of the governor of the castle (for such the
innkeeper and inn seemed to him), "Senior Castellano," said he, "the
least thing in the world suffices me; for arms are the only things I
value, and combat is my bed of repose." "At this rate, Sir Knight, you
may safely alight, and I dare assure you, you can hardly miss being
kept awake all the year long in this house, much less one single
night." With that he went and held Don Quixote's stirrup, who having
ate nothing all that day, dismounted with no small trouble and
difficulty. He immediately desired the governor (that is, the
innkeeper) to have special care of his steed, assuring him that there
was not a better in the universe; upon which the innkeeper viewed him
narrowly, but could not think him to be half so good as Don Quixote
said. However, having set him up in the stable, he came back to the
knight to see what he wanted, and whether he would eat anything. "That
I will, with all my heart," cried Don Quixote, "whatever it be; for I
am of opinion nothing can come to me more seasonably." Now, it
happened to be Friday, and there was nothing to be had at the inn but
some pieces of fish, which they call _truchuela_; so they asked him
whether he could eat any of that truchuela, because they had no other
fish to give him. Don Quixote imagining they meant small trout, told
them, that provided there were more than one, it was the same thing to
him, they would serve him as well as a great one; "for," continued he,
"it is all one to me whether I am paid a piece of eight in one single
piece, or in eight small reals, which are worth as much. Besides, it
is probable these small trouts may be like veal, which is finer meat
than beef; or like the kid, which is better than the goat. In short,
let it be what it will, so it comes quickly; for the weight of armour
and the fatigue of travel are not to be supported without recruiting
food." Thereupon they laid the cloth at the inn-door for the benefit
of the fresh air, and the landlord brought him a piece of the salt
fish, but ill-watered and as ill-dressed; and as for the bread, it was
as mouldy and brown as the knight's armour.
While he was at supper, a pig-driver happened to sound his
cane-trumpet, or whistle of reeds, four or five times as he came near
the inn, which made Don Quixote the more positive that he was in a
famous castle, where he was entertained with music at supper, that
the country girls were great ladies, and the innkeeper the governor of
the castle, which made him applaud himself for his resolution, and his
setting out on such an account. The only thing that vexed him was,
that he was not yet dubbed a knight; for he fancied he could not
lawfully undertake any adventure till he had received the order of
knighthood.
CHAPTER III.
_An account of the pleasant method taken by Don Quixote to be dubbed a
knight._
Don Quixote's mind being disturbed with that thought, he abridged even
his short supper; and as soon as he had done, he called his host, then
shut him and himself up in the stable, and falling at his feet, "I
will never rise from this place," cried he, "most valorous knight,
till you have graciously vouchsafed to grant me a boon, which I will
now beg of you, and which will redound to your honour and the good of
mankind." The innkeeper, strangely at a loss to find his guest at his
feet, and talking at this rate, endeavoured to make him rise; but all
in vain, till he had promised to grant him what he asked. "I expected
no less from your great magnificence, noble sir," replied Don Quixote;
"and therefore I make bold to tell you, that the boon which I beg, and
you generously condescend to grant me, is, that to-morrow you will be
pleased to bestow the honour of knighthood upon me. This night I will
watch my armour in the chapel of your castle, and then in the morning
you shall gratify me, that I may be duly qualified to seek out
adventures in every corner of the universe, to relieve the distressed,
according to the laws of chivalry and the inclinations of
knights-errant like myself." The innkeeper, who, as I said, was a
sharp fellow, and had already a shrewd suspicion of his guest's
disorder, was fully convinced of it when he heard him talk in this
manner; and, to make sport he resolved to humour him, telling him he
was much to be commended for his choice of such an employment, which
was altogether worthy a knight of the first order, such as his gallant
deportment discovered him to be: that he himself had in his youth
followed that profession, ranging through many parts of the world in
search of adventures, till at length he retired to this castle, where
he lived on his own estate and those of others, entertaining all
knights-errant of what quality or condition soever, purely for the
great affection he bore them, and to partake of what they might share
with him in return. He added, that his castle at present had no chapel
where the knight might keep the vigil of his arms, it being pulled
down in order to be new built; but that he knew they might lawfully
be watched in any other place in a case of necessity, and therefore he
might do it that night in the court-yard of the castle; and in the
morning all the necessary ceremonies should be performed, so that he
might assure himself he should be dubbed a knight, nay as much a
knight as any one in the world could be. He then asked Don Quixote
whether he had any money? "Not a cross," replied the knight, "for I
never read in any history of chivalry that any knight-errant ever
carried money about him." "You are mistaken," cried the innkeeper;
"for admit the histories are silent in this matter, the authors
thinking it needless to mention things so evidently necessary as money
and clean shirts, yet there is no reason to believe the knights went
without either; and you may rest assured, that all the knights-errant,
of whom so many histories are full, had their purses well lined to
supply themselves with necessaries, and carried also with them some
shirts, and a small box of salves to heal their wounds; for they had
not the conveniency of surgeons to cure them every time they fought in
fields and deserts, unless they were so happy as to have some sage or
magician for their friend to give them present assistance, sending
them some damsel or dwarf through the air in a cloud, with a small
bottle of water of so great a virtue, that they no sooner tasted a
drop of it, but their wounds were as perfectly cured as if they had
never received any. But when they wanted such a friend in former ages,
the knights thought themselves obliged to take care that their squires
should be provided with money and other necessaries; and if those
knights ever happened to have no squires, which was but very seldom,
then they carried those things behind them in a little bag. I must
therefore advise you," continued he, "never from this time forwards to
ride without money, nor without the other necessaries of which I spoke
to you, which you will find very beneficial when you least expect it."
Don Quixote promised to perform all his injunctions; and so they
disposed every thing in order to his watching his arms in the great
yard. To which purpose the knight, having got them all together, laid
them in a horse-trough close by a well; then bracing his target, and
grasping his lance, just as it grew dark, he began to walk about by
the horse-trough with a graceful deportment. In the mean while, the
innkeeper acquainted all those that were in the house with the
extravagancies of his guest, his watching his arms, and his hopes of
being made a knight. They all marvelled very much at so strange a kind
of folly, and went on to observe him at a distance; where, they saw
him sometimes walk about with a great deal of gravity, and sometimes
lean on his lance, with his eyes all the while fixed upon his arms. It
was now undoubted night, but yet the moon did shine with such a
brightness, as might almost have vied with that of the luminary which
lent it her; so that the knight was wholly exposed to the spectators'
view. While he was thus employed, one of the carriers who lodged in
the inn came out to water his mules, which he could not do without
removing the arms out of the trough. With that, Don Quixote, who saw
him make towards them, cried out to him aloud, "O thou, whoever thou
art, rash knight, that prepares to lay thy hands on the arms of the
most valorous knight-errant that ever wore a sword, take heed; do not
audaciously attempt to profane them with a touch, lest instant death
be the too sure reward of thy temerity." But the carrier regarded not
these threats; and laying hold of the armour without any more ado,
threw it a good way from him; though it had been better for him to
have let it alone; for Don Quixote no sooner saw this, but lifting up
his eyes to heaven, and thus addressing his thoughts, as it seemed, to
his lady Dulcinea; "Assist me, lady," cried he, "in the first
opportunity that offers itself to your faithful slave; nor let your
favour and protection be denied me in this first trial of my valour!"
Repeating such-like ejaculations, he let slip his target, and lifting
up his lance with both his hands, he gave the carrier such a terrible
knock on his inconsiderate head with his lance, that he laid him at
his feet in a woful condition; and had he backed that blow with
another, the fellow would certainly have had no need of a surgeon.
This done, Don Quixote took up his armour, laid it again in the
horse-trough, and then walked on backwards and forwards with as great
unconcern as he did at first.
Soon after another carrier, not knowing what had happened, came also
to water his mules, while the first yet lay on the ground in a trance;
but as he offered to clear the trough of the armour, Don Quixote,
without speaking a word, or imploring any one's assistance, once more
dropped his target, lifted up his lance, and then let it fall so
heavily on the fellow's pate, that without damaging his lance, he
broke the carrier's head in three or four places. His outcry soon
alarmed and brought thither all the people in the inn, and the
landlord among the rest; which Don Quixote perceiving, "Thou Queen of
Beauty," cried he, bracing on his shield, and drawing his sword, "thou
courage and vigour of my weakened heart, now is the time when thou
must enliven thy adventurous slave with the beams of thy greatness,
while this moment he is engaging in so terrible an adventure!" With
this, in his opinion, he found himself supplied with such an addition
of courage, that had all the carriers in the world at once attacked
him, he would undoubtedly have faced them all. On the other side, the
carriers, enraged to see their comrades thus used, though they were
afraid to come near, gave the knight such a volley of stones, that he
was forced to shelter himself as well as he could under the covert of
his target, without daring to go far from the horse-trough, lest he
should seem to abandon his arms. The innkeeper called to the carriers
as loud as he could to let him alone; that he had told them already he
was mad, and consequently the law would acquit him, though he should
kill them. Don Quixote also made yet more noise, calling them false
and treacherous villains, and the lord of the castle base and
unhospitable, and a discourteous knight, for suffering a knight-errant
to be so abused. "I would make thee know," cried he, "what a
perfidious wretch thou art, had I but received the order of
knighthood; but for you, base, ignominious rabble, fling on, do your
worst; come on, draw nearer if you dare, and receive the reward of
your indiscretion and insolence." This he spoke with so much spirit
and undauntedness, that he struck a terror into all his assailants; so
that, partly through fear, and partly through the innkeeper's
persuasions, they gave over flinging stones at him; and he, on his
side, permitted the enemy to carry off their wounded, and then
returned to the guard of his arms as calm and composed as before.
The innkeeper, who began somewhat to disrelish these mad tricks of his
guest, resolved to despatch him forthwith, and bestow on him that
unlucky knighthood, to prevent farther mischief: so coming to him, he
excused himself for the insolence of those base scoundrels, as being
done without his privity or consent; but their audaciousness, he said,
was sufficiently punished. He added, that he had already told him
there was no chapel in his castle; and that indeed there was no need
of one to finish the rest of the ceremony of knighthood, which
consisted only in the application of the sword to the neck and
shoulders, as he had read in the register of the ceremonies of the
order; and that this might be performed as well in a field as anywhere
else: that he had already fulfilled the obligation of watching his
arms, which required no more than two hours watch, whereas he had been
four hours upon the guard. Don Quixote, who easily believed him, told
him he was ready to obey him, and desired him to make an end of the
business as soon as possible; for if he were but knighted, and should
see himself once attacked, he believed he should not leave a man alive
in the castle, except those whom he should desire him to spare for his
sake.
Upon this, the innkeeper, lest the knight should proceed to such
extremities, fetched the book in which he used to set down the
carriers' accounts for straw and barley; and having brought with him
the two kind females already mentioned, and a boy that held a piece of
lighted candle in his hand, he ordered Don Quixote to kneel: then
reading in his manual, as if he had been repeating some pious oration,
in the midst of his devotion he lifted up his hand, and gave him a
good blow on the neck, and then a gentle slap on the back with the
flat of his sword, still mumbling some words between his teeth in the
tone of a prayer. After this he ordered one of the ladies to gird the
sword about the knight's waist: which she did with much solemnity,
and, I may add, discretion, considering how hard a thing it was to
forbear laughing at every circumstance of the ceremony: it is true,
the thoughts of the knight's late prowess did not a little contribute
to the suppression of her mirth. As she girded on his sword, "Heaven,"
cried the kind lady, "make your worship a lucky knight, and prosper
you wherever you go." Don Quixote desired to know her name, that he
might understand to whom he was indebted for the favour she had
bestowed upon him, and also make her partaker of the honour he was to
acquire by the strength of his arm. To which the lady answered with
all humility, that her name was Tolosa, a cobbler's daughter, that
kept a stall among the little shops of Sanchobinaya at Toledo; and
that whenever he pleased to command her, she would be his humble
servant. Don Quixote begged of her to do him the favour to add
hereafter the title of lady to her name, and for his sake to be called
from that time the Lady Toloso; which she promised to do. Her
companion having buckled on his spurs, occasioned a like conference
between them; and when he had asked her name, she told him she went by
the name of Molivera, being the daughter of an honest miller of
Antequera. Our new knight entreated her also to style herself the Lady
Molivera, making her new offers of service. These extraordinary
ceremonies (the like never seen before) being thus hurried over in a
kind of post-haste, Don Quixote could not rest till he had taken the
field in quest of adventures; therefore having immediately saddled his
Rozinante, and being mounted, he embraced the innkeeper, and returned
him so many thanks at so extravagant a rate, for the obligation he had
laid upon him in dubbing him a knight, that it is impossible to give a
true relation of them all; to which the innkeeper, in haste to get rid
of him, returned as rhetorical though shorter answers; and without
stopping his horse for the reckoning, was glad with all his heart to
see him go.
CHAPTER IV.
_What befel the Knight after he had left the inn._
Aurora began to usher in the morn, when Don Quixote sallied out of the
inn, so overjoyed to find himself knighted, that he infused the same
satisfaction into his horse, who seemed ready to burst his girths for
joy. But calling to mind the admonitions which the innkeeper had given
him, concerning the provision of necessary accommodation in his
travels, particularly money and clean shirts, he resolved to return
home to furnish himself with them, and likewise get him a squire,
designing to entertain as such a labouring man, his neighbour, who was
poor and had a number of children, but yet very fit for the office.
With this resolution he took the road which led to his own village.
The knight had not travelled far, when he fancied he heard an
effeminate voice complaining in a thicket on his right hand. "I thank
Heaven," said he, when he heard the cries, "for favouring me so soon
with an opportunity to perform the duty of my profession, and reap the
fruits of my desire; for these complaints are certainly the moans of
some distressed creature who wants my present help." Then turning to
that side with all the speed which Rozinante could make, he no sooner
came into the wood but he found a mare tied to an oak, and to another
a young lad about fifteen years of age, naked from the waist upwards.
This was he who made such a lamentable outcry; and not without cause,
for a lusty country-fellow was strapping him soundly with a girdle, at
every stripe putting him in mind of a proverb, _Keep your mouth shut,
and your eyes open_. "Good master," cried the boy, "I'll do so no
more: indeed, master, hereafter I'll take more care of your goods."
Don Quixote seeing this, cried in an angry tone, "Discourteous knight,
'tis an unworthy act to strike a person who is not able to defend
himself: come, bestride thy steed, and take thy lance, then I'll make
thee know thou hast acted the part of a coward." The country-fellow,
who gave himself for lost at the sight of an apparition in armour
brandishing his lance at his face, answered him in mild and submissive
words: "Sir knight," cried he, "this boy, whom I am chastising, is my
servant; and because I correct him for his carelessness or his
knavery, he says I do it out of covetousness, to defraud him of his
wages; but, upon my life and soul, he belies me." "Sayest thou this in
my presence, vile rustic," cried Don Quixote; "for thy insolent
speech, I have a good mind to run thee through the body with my lance.
Pay the boy this instant, without any more words, or I will
immediately despatch and annihilate thee: unbind him, I say, this
moment." The countryman hung down his head, and without any further
reply unbound the boy; who being asked by Don Quixote what his master
owed him, told him it was nine months' wages, at seven reals a month.
The knight having cast it up, found it came to sixty-three reals in
all; which he ordered the farmer to pay the fellow immediately, unless
he intended to lose his life that very moment. "The worst is, sir
knight," cried the farmer, "that I have no money about me; but let
Andres go home with me, and I'll pay him every piece out of hand."
"What, I go home with him!" cried the youngster; "I know better
things: for he'd no sooner have me by himself, but he'd flay me alive,
like another St. Bartholomew." "He will not dare," replied Don
Quixote; "I command him, and that's sufficient: therefore, provided he
will swear by the order of knighthood which has been conferred upon
him, that he will duly observe this regulation, I will freely let him
go, and then thou art secure of thy money." "Good sir, take heed what
you say," cried the boy; "for my master is no knight, nor ever was of
any order in his life: he's John Haldudo, the rich farmer of
Quintinar." "This signifies little," answered Don Quixote, "for there
may be knights among the Haldudos; besides, the brave man carves out
his fortune, and every man is the son of his own works." "That's true,
sir," quoth Andres; "but of what works can this master of mine be the
son, who denies me my wages, which I have earned with the sweat of my
brows?" "I do not deny to pay thee thy wages, honest Andres," cried
the master; "do but go along with me, and by all the orders of
knighthood in the world, I promise to pay thee every piece, as I
said." "Be sure," said Don Quixote, "you perform your promise; for if
you fail, I will assuredly return and find you out, and punish you
moreover, though you should hide yourself as close as a lizard. And if
you will be informed who it is that lays these injunctions on you,
that you may understand how highly it concerns you to observe them,
know, I am Don Quixote de la Mancha, the righter of wrongs, the
revenger and redresser of grievances; and so farewell: but remember
what you have promised and sworn, as you will answer for it at your
peril." This said, he clapped spurs to Rozinante, and quickly left
them behind.
The countryman, who followed him with both his eyes, no sooner
perceived that he was passed the woods, and quite out of sight, than
he went back to his boy Andres. "Come, child," said he, "I will pay
thee what I owe thee, as that righter of wrongs and redresser of
grievances has ordered me." "Ay," quoth Andres, "on my word, you will
do well to fulfil the commands of that good knight, whom Heaven grant
long to live; for he is so brave a man, and so just a judge, that if
you don't pay me, he will come back and make his words good." "I dare
swear as much," answered the master; "and to shew thee how much I love
thee, I am willing to increase the debt, that I may enlarge the
payment." With that he caught the youngster by the arm, and tied him
again to the tree; where he handled him so unmercifully, that scarce
any signs of life were left in him. "Now call your righter of wrongs,
Mr. Andres," cried the farmer, "and you shall see he will never be
able to undo what I have done; though I think it is but a part of what
I ought to do, for I have a good mind to flay you alive, as you said I
would, you rascal." However, he untied him at last, and gave him leave
to go and seek out his judge, in order to have his decree put in
execution. Andres went his ways, not very well pleased, you may be
sure, yet fully resolved to find out the valorous Don Quixote, and
give him an exact account of the whole transaction, that he might pay
the abuse with sevenfold usury: in short, he crept off sobbing and
weeping, while his master stayed behind laughing. And in this manner
was this wrong redressed by the valorous Don Quixote de la Mancha.
In the mean time the knight, being highly pleased with himself and
what had happened, imagining he had given a most fortunate and noble
beginning to his feats of arms, went on towards his village, and soon
found himself at a place where four roads met; and this made him
presently bethink of those cross-ways which often used to put
knights-errant to a stand, to consult with themselves which way they
should take. That he might follow their example, he stopped a while,
and after he had seriously reflected on the matter, gave Rozinante the
reins, subjecting his own will to that of his horse, who, pursuing his
first intent, took the way that led to his own stable.
Don Quixote had not gone above two miles, when he discovered a company
of people riding towards him, who proved to be merchants of Toledo,
going to buy silks in Murcia. They were six in all, every one screened
with an umbrella, besides four servants on horseback, and three
muleteers on foot. The knight no sooner perceived them but he imagined
this to be some new adventure; so, fixing himself in his stirrups,
couching his lance, and covering his breast with his target, he posted
himself in the middle of the road, expecting the coming up of the
supposed knights-errant. As soon as they came within hearing, with a
loud voice and haughty tone, "Hold," cried he; "let no man hope to
pass further, unless he acknowledge and confess that there is not in
the universe a more beautiful damsel than the empress of La Mancha,
the peerless Dulcinea del Toboso." At those words the merchants made a
halt, to view the unaccountable figure of their opponent; and
conjecturing, both by his expression and disguise, that the poor
gentleman had lost his senses, they were willing to understand the
meaning of that strange confession which he would force from them; and
therefore one of the company, who loved raillery, and had discretion
to manage it, undertook to talk to him. "Signor cavalier," cried he,
"we do not know this worthy lady you talk of; but be pleased to let us
see her, and then if we find her possessed of those matchless charms,
of which you assert her to be the mistress, we will freely, and
without the least compulsion, own the truth which you would extort
from us." "Had I once shewn you that beauty," replied Don Quixote,
"what wonder would it be to acknowledge so notorious a truth? the
importance of the thing lies in obliging you to believe it, confess
it, affirm it, swear it, and maintain it, without seeing her; and
therefore make this acknowledgment this very moment, or know that with
me you must join in battle, ye proud and unreasonable mortals! Come
one by one, as the laws of chivalry require, or all at once, according
to the dishonourable practice of men of your stamp; here I expect you
all my single self, and will stand the encounter, confiding in the
justice of my cause." "Sir knight," replied the merchant, "I beseech
you, that for the discharge of our consciences, which will not permit
us to affirm a thing we never heard or saw, and which, besides, tends
so much to the dishonour of the empresses and queens of Alcaria and
Estremadura, your worship will vouchsafe to let us see some
portraiture of that lady, though it were no bigger than a grain of
wheat; for by a small sample we may judge of the whole piece, and by
that means rest secure and satisfied, and you contented and appeased.
Nay, I verily believe, that we all find ourselves already so
inclinable to comply with you, that though her picture should
represent her to be blind of one eye, and distilling vermilion and
brimstone at the other, yet to oblige you, we shall be ready to say in
her favour whatever your worship desires." "Distil, ye infamous
scoundrels," replied Don Quixote in a burning rage, "distil, say you?
know, that nothing distils from her but amber and civet; neither is
she defective in her make or shape, but more straight than a
Guadaramian spindle. But you shall all severely pay for the blasphemy
which thou hast uttered against the transcendent beauty of my
incomparable lady." Saying this, with his lance couched, he ran so
furiously at the merchant who thus provoked him, that had not good
fortune so ordered it that Rozinante should stumble and fall in the
midst of his career, the audacious trifler had paid dear for his
raillery: but as Rozinante fell, he threw down his master, who rolled
and tumbled a good way on the ground without being able to get upon
his legs, though he used all his skill and strength to effect it, so
encumbered he was with his lance, target, spurs, helmet, and the
weight of his rusty armour. However, in this helpless condition he
played the hero with his tongue; "Stay," cried he; "cowards, rascals,
do not fly! it is not through my fault that I lie here, but through
that of my horse, ye poltroons!"
One of the muleteers, who was none of the best-natured creatures,
hearing the overthrown knight thus insolently treat his master, could
not bear it without returning him an answer on his ribs; and therefore
coming up to him as he lay wallowing, he snatched his lance, and
having broke it to pieces, so belaboured Don Quixote's sides with one
of them, that, in spite of his arms, he thrashed him like a
wheatsheaf. His master indeed called to him not to lay on him so
vigorously, and to let him alone; but the fellow, whose hand was in,
would not give over till he had tired out his passion and himself; and
therefore running to the other pieces of the broken lance, he fell to
it again without ceasing, till he had splintered them all on the
knight's iron enclosure. At last the mule-driver was tired, and the
merchants pursued their journey, sufficiently furnished with matter of
discourse at the poor knight's expense. When he found himself alone,
he tried once more to get on his feet; but if he could not do it when
he had the use of his limbs, how should he do it now, bruised and
battered as he was? But yet for all this, he esteemed himself a happy
man, being still persuaded that his misfortune was one of those
accidents common in knight-errantry, and such a one as he could wholly
attribute to the falling of his horse.
CHAPTER V.
_A further account of our Knight's misfortunes._
Don Quixote perceiving that he was not able to stir, resolved to have
recourse to his usual remedy, which was to bethink himself what
passage in his books might afford him some comfort: and presently his
frenzy brought to his remembrance the story of Baldwin and the Marquis
of Mantua, when Charlot left the former wounded on the mountain; a
story learned and known by little children, not unknown to young men
and women, celebrated, and even believed, by the old, and yet not a
jot more authentic than the miracles of Mahomet. This seemed to him as
if made on purpose for his present circumstances, and therefore he
fell a rolling and tumbling up and down, expressing the greatest pain
and resentment, and breathing out, with a languishing voice, the same
complaints which the wounded Knight of the Wood is said to have made!
"Alas! where are you, lady dear,
That for my woe you do not moan?
You little know what ails me here,
Or are to me disloyal grown."
Thus he went on with the lamentations in that romance, till he came to
these verses:--
"O thou, my uncle and my prince,
Marquis of Mantua, noble lord!"--
When kind fortune so ordered it that a ploughman, who lived in the
same village, and near his house, happened to pass by, as he came from
the mill with a sack of wheat. The fellow seeing a man lie at his full
length on the ground, asked him who he was, and why he made such a sad
complaint. Don Quixote, whose distempered brain presently represented
to him the countryman as the Marquis of Mantua, his imaginary uncle,
made him no answer, but went on with the romance. The fellow stared,
much amazed to hear a man talk such unaccountable stuff; and taking
off the vizor of his helmet, broken all to pieces with blows bestowed
upon it by the mule-driver, he wiped off the dust that covered his
face, and presently knew the gentleman. "Master Quixada!" cried he
(for so he was properly called when he had the right use of his
senses, and had not yet from a sober gentleman transformed himself
into a wandering knight); "how came you in this condition?" But the
other continued his romance, and made no answers to all the questions
the countryman put to him, but what followed in course in the book:
which the good man perceiving, he took off the battered adventurer's
armour as well as he could, and fell a searching for his wounds; but
finding no sign of blood, or any other hurt, he endeavoured to set him
upon his legs; and at last with a great deal of trouble, he heaved him
upon his own ass, as being the more easy and gentle carriage: he also
got all the knight's arms together, not leaving behind so much as the
splinters of his lance; and having tied them up, and laid them on
Rozinante, which he took by the bridle, and his ass by the halter, he
led them all towards the village, and trudged on foot himself, while
he reflected on the extravagances which he heard Don Quixote utter.
Nor was the Don himself less melancholy; for he felt himself so
bruised and battered that he could hardly sit on the ass; and now and
then he breathed such grievous sighs, as seemed to pierce the very
skies, which moved his compassionate neighbour once more to entreat
him to declare to him the cause of his grief: so he bethought himself
of the Moor Abindaraez, whom Rodrigo de Narvaez, Alcade of Antequera,
took and carried prisoner to his castle; so that when the husbandman
asked him how he did and what ailed him, he answered word for word as
the prisoner Abindaraez replied to Rodrigo de Narvaez, in the Diana of
George di Montemayor, where that adventure is related; applying it so
properly to his purpose, that the countryman wished himself any where
than within the hearing of such strange nonsense; and being now fully
convinced that his neighbour's brains were turned, he made all the
haste he could to the village, to be rid of him. Don Quixote in the
mean time thus went on: "You must know, Don Rodrigo de Narvaez, that
this beautiful Xerifa, of whom I gave you an account, is at present
the most lovely Dulcinea del Toboso, for whose sake I have done, still
do, and will achieve the most famous deeds of chivalry that ever were,
are, or ever shall be seen in the universe." "Good sir," replied the
husbandman, "I am not Don Rodrigo de Narvaez, nor the Marquis of
Mantua, but Pedro Alonzo by name, your worship's neighbour; nor are
you Baldwin, nor Abindaraez, but only that worthy gentleman Senior
Quixada." "I know very well who I am," answered Don Quixote; "and
what's more, I know, that I may not only be the persons I have named,
but also the twelve peers of France, nay and the nine worthies all in
one; since my achievements will out-rival not only the famous exploits
which made any of them singly illustrious, but all their mighty deeds
accumulated together."
Thus discoursing, they at last got near their village about sunset;
but the countryman stayed at some distance till it was dark, that the
distressed gentleman might not be seen so scurvily mounted, and then
he led him home to his own house, which he found in great confusion.
The curate and the barber of the village, both of them Don Quixote's
intimate acquaintances, happened to be there at that juncture, as also
the housekeeper, who was arguing with them: "What do you think, pray,
good Doctor Perez," said she, (for this was the curate's name) "what
do you think of my master's mischance? neither he, nor his horse, nor
his target, lance, nor armour, have been seen these six days. What
shall I do, wretch that I am? I dare lay my life, and it is as sure as
I am a living creature, that those cursed books of errantry, which he
used to be always poring upon, have set him beside his senses; for now
I remember I have heard him often mutter to himself that he had a mind
to turn knight-errant, and ramble up and down the world to find out
adventures." His niece added, addressing herself to the barber; "You
must know, Mr. Nicholas, that many times my uncle would read you those
unconscionable books of disventures for eight-and-forty hours
together; then away he would throw his book, and drawing his sword, he
would fall a fencing against the walls; and when he had tired himself
with cutting and slashing, he would cry he had killed four giants as
big as any steeples; and the sweat which he put himself into, he would
say was the blood of the wounds he had received in the fight: then
would he swallow a huge jug of cold water, and presently he would be
as quiet and as well as ever he was in his life; and he said that this
same water was a sort of precious drink brought him by the sage
Esquife, a great magician and his special friend. Now, it is I who am
the cause of all this mischief, for not giving you timely notice of my
uncle's raving, that you might have put a stop to it, ere it was too
late, and have burnt all these excommunicated books; for there are I
do not know how many of them that deserve as much to be burnt as those
of the rankest heretics." "I am of your mind," said the curate; "and
verily to-morrow shall not pass over before I have fairly brought them
to a trial, and condemned them to the flames, that they may not
minister occasion to such as would read them, to be perverted after
the example of my good friend."
The countryman, who, with Don Quixote, stood without, listening to all
this discourse, now perfectly understood the cause of his neighbour's
disorder; and, without any more ado, he called out, "Open the gates
there, for the Lord Baldwin, and the Lord Marquis of Mantua, who is
coming sadly wounded; and for the Moorish Lord Abindaraez, whom the
valorous Don Rodrigo de Narvaez, Alcade of Antequera, brings
prisoner." At which words they all got out of doors; and the one
finding it to be her uncle, and the other to be her master, and the
rest their friend, who had not yet alighted from the ass, because
indeed he was not able, they all ran to embrace him; to whom Don
Quixote: "Forbear," said he, "for I am sorely hurt, by reason that my
horse failed me; carry me to bed, and, if it be possible, let the
enchantress Urganda be sent for to cure my wounds." "Now," quoth the
housekeeper, "see whether I did not guess right, on which foot my
master halted!--Come, get to bed, I beseech you; and, my life for
yours, we will take care to cure you without sending for that same
Urganda. A hearty curse, I say, light upon those books of chivalry
that have put you in this pickle!" Whereupon they carried him to his
bed, and searched for his wounds, but could find none; and then he
told them he was only bruised, having had a dreadful fall from his
horse Rozinante while he was fighting ten giants, the most outrageous
and audacious upon the face of the earth. "Ho, ho!" cried the curate,
"are there giants too in the dance? nay, then, we will have them all
burnt by to-morrow night." Then they asked the Don a thousand
questions, but to every one he made no other answer, but that they
should give him something to eat, and then leave him to his repose.
They complied with his desires; and then the curate informed himself
at large in what condition the countryman had found him; and having
had a full account of every particular, as also of the knight's
extravagant talk, both when the fellow found him, and as he brought
him home, this increased the curate's desire of effecting what he had
resolved to do next morning: at which time he called upon his friend,
Mr. Nicholas the barber, and went with him to Don Quixote's house.
CHAPTER VI.
_Of the pleasant and curious scrutiny which the Curate and the Barber
made of the library of our ingenious gentleman._
The knight was yet asleep, when the curate came, attended by the
barber, and desired his niece to let him have the key of the room
where her uncle kept his books, the author of his woes: she readily
consented; and so in they went, and the housekeeper with them. There
they found above an hundred large volumes neatly bound, and a good
number of small ones. As soon as the housekeeper had spied them out,
she ran out of the study, and returned immediately with a holy-water
pot and a sprinkler: "Here, doctor," cried she, "pray sprinkle every
cranny and corner in the room, lest there should lurk in it some one
of the many sorcerers these books swarm with, who might chance to
bewitch us, for the ill-will we bear them, in going about to send them
out of the world." The curate could not forbear smiling at the good
woman's simplicity; and desired the barber to reach him the books one
by one, that he might peruse the title-pages, for perhaps he might
find some among them that might not deserve this fate. "Oh, by no
means," cried the niece; "spare none of them; they all help, somehow
or other, to crack my uncle's brain. I fancy we had best throw them
all out at the window in the yard, and lay them together in a heap,
and then set them on fire, or else carry them into the back-yard, and
there make a pile of them, and burn them, and so the smoke will offend
nobody." The housekeeper joined with her, so eagerly bent were both
upon the destruction of those poor innocents; but the curate would not
condescend to those irregular proceedings, and resolved first to read
at least the title-page of every book.
The first that Mr. Nicholas put into his hands was Amadis de Gaul, in
four volumes. "There seems to be some mystery in this book's being the
first taken down," cried the curate, as soon as he had looked upon it;
"for I have heard it is the first book of knight-errantry that ever
was printed in Spain, and the model of all the rest; and therefore I
am of opinion, that, as the first teacher and author of so pernicious
a sect, it ought to be condemned to the fire without mercy." "I beg a
reprieve for him," cried the barber; "for I have been told 'tis the
best book that has been written in that kind; and therefore, as the
only good thing of that sort, it may deserve a pardon." "Well then,"
replied the curate, "for this time let him have it. Let's see that
other, which lies next to him." "These," said the barber, "are the
exploits of Esplandian, the son of Amadis de Gaul." "Verily," said the
curate, "the father's goodness shall not excuse the want of it in the
son. Here, good mistress housekeeper, open that window, and throw it
into the yard, and let it serve as a foundation to that pile we are to
set a blazing presently." She was not slack in her obedience; and thus
poor Don Esplandian was sent headlong into the yard, there patiently
to wait the time of punishment.
"To the next," cried the curate. "This," said the barber, "is Amadis
of Greece; and I'm of opinion that all those that stand on this side
are of the same family." "Then let them all be sent packing into the
yard," replied the curate. They were delivered to the housekeeper
accordingly, and many they were; and to save herself the labour of
carrying them down stairs, she fairly sent them flying out at the
window.
"What overgrown piece of lumber have we here?" cried the curate.
"Olivante de Laura," returned the barber. "The same author wrote the
Garden of Flowers; and, to deal ingeniously with you, I cannot tell
which of the two books has most truth in it, or, to speak more
properly, less lies: but this I know for certain, that he shall march
into the back-yard, like a nonsensical arrogant blockhead as he is."
"The next," cried the barber, "is Florismart of Hyrcania." "How! my
Lord Florismart, is he here?" replied the curate: "nay, then truly, he
shall e'en follow the rest to the yard, in spite of his wonderful
birth and incredible adventures; for his rough, dull, and insipid
style deserves no better usage. Come, toss him into the yard, and this
other too, good mistress."
"Here's the noble Don Platir," cried the barber. "'Tis an old book,"
replied the curate, "and I can think of nothing in him that deserves a
grain of pity: away with him, without any more words;" and down he
went accordingly.
Another book was opened, and it proved to be the Knight of the Cross.
"The holy title," cried the curate, "might in some measure atone for
the badness of the book; but then, as the saying is, _The devil lurks
behind the cross_! To the flames with him."
Then opening another volume, he found it to be Palmerin de Oliva, and
the next to that Palmerin of England. "Ha, have I found you!" cried
the curate. "Here, take that Oliva, let him be torn to pieces, then
burnt, and his ashes scattered in the air; but let Palmerin of England
be preserved as a singular relic of antiquity; and let such a costly
box be made for him as Alexander found among the spoils of Darius,
which he devoted to enclose Homer's works: for I must tell you,
neighbour, that book deserves particular respect for two things;
first, for its own excellencies; and, secondly, for the sake of its
author, who is said to have been a learned king of Portugal: then all
the adventures of the Castle of Miraguarda are well and artfully
managed, the dialogue very courtly and clear, and the decorum strictly
observed in equal character, with equal propriety and judgment.
Therefore, Master Nicholas," continued he, "with submission to your
better advice, this and Amadis de Gaul shall be exempted from the
fire; and let all the rest be condemned, without any further inquiry
or examination." "By no means, I beseech you," returned the barber,
"for this which I have in my hands is the famous Don Bellianis."
"Truly," cried the curate, "he, with his second, third, and fourth
parts, had need of a dose of rhubarb to purge his excessive choler:
besides, his Castle of Fame should be demolished, and a heap of other
rubbish removed; in order to which I give my vote to grant them the
benefit of a reprieve; and as they shew signs of amendment, so shall
mercy or justice be used towards them: in the mean time, neighbour,
take them into custody, and keep them safe at home; but let none be
permitted to converse with them." "Content," cried the barber; and to
save himself the labour of looking on any more books of that kind, he
bid the housekeeper take all the great volumes, and throw them into
the yard. This was not spoken to one stupid or deaf, but to one who
had a greater mind to be burning them, than weaving the finest and
largest web: so that laying hold of no less than eight volumes at
once, she presently made them leap towards the place of execution.
"But what shall we do with all these smaller books that are left?"
said the barber. "Certainly," replied the curate, "these cannot be
books of knight-errantry, they are too small; you will find they are
only poets." And so opening one, it happened to be the Diana of
Montemayor; which made him say, (believing all the rest to be of that
stamp) "These do not deserve to be punished like the others, for they
neither have done, nor can do, that mischief which those stories of
chivalry have done, being generally ingenious books, that can do
nobody any prejudice." "Oh! good sir," cried the niece, "burn them
with the rest, I beseech you; for should my uncle get cured of his
knight-errant frenzy, and betake himself to the reading of these
books, we should have him turn shepherd, and so wander through the
woods and fields; nay, and what would be worse yet, turn poet, which
they say is a catching and incurable disease." "The gentlewoman is in
the right," said the curate; "and it will not be amiss to remove that
stumbling-block out of our friend's way; and since we began with the
Diana of Montemayor, I am of opinion we ought not to burn it, but only
take out that part of it which treats of the magician Felicia and the
enchanted water, as also all the longer poems; and let the work escape
with its prose, and the honour of being the first of that kind."
"Here," quoth the barber, "I've a book called the Ten Books of the
Fortunes of Love, by Anthony de Lofraco, a Sardinian poet." "Now we
have got a prize," cried the curate, "I do not think since Apollo was
Apollo, the muses muses, and the poets poets, there ever was a more
humorous, more whimsical book! Of all the works of the kind commend me
to this, for in its way 'tis certainly the best and most singular that
ever was published; and he that never read it may safely think he
never in his life read any thing that was pleasant." With that he laid
it aside with extraordinary satisfaction; and the barber went on: "The
next," said he, "is the Shepherd of Filida." "He's no shepherd,"
returned the curate, "but a very discreet courtier; keep him as a
precious jewel." "Here's a bigger," cried the barber, "called the
Treasure of divers Poems." "Had there been less of it," said the
curate, "it would have been more esteemed. 'Tis fit the book should be
pruned and cleared of some inferior things that encumber and deform
it: keep it, however, because the author is my friend, and for the
sake of his other more heroic and lofty productions. What's the next
book?" "The Galatea of Miguel de Cervantes," replied the barber. "That
Cervantes has been my intimate acquaintance these many years," cried
the curate; "and I know he has been more conversant with misfortunes
than with poetry. His book, indeed, has I don't know what, that looks
like a good design; he aims at something, but concludes nothing:
therefore we must stay for the second part, which he has promised us;
perhaps he may make us amends, and obtain a full pardon, which is
denied him for the present; till that time keep him close prisoner at
your house." "I will," quoth the barber: "but see, I have here three
more for you, the Araucana of Don Alonso de Ercilla; the Austirada of
Juan Ruffo, a magistrate of Cordova; and the Monserrato of Christopher
de Virves, a Valentian poet." "These," cried the curate, "are the best
heroic poems we have in Spanish, and may vie with the most celebrated
of Italy: reserve them as the most valuable performances which Spain
has to boast of in poetry."
At last the curate grew so tired with prying into so many volumes,
that he ordered all the rest to be burnt at a venture. But the barber
shewed him one which he had opened by chance ere the dreadful sentence
was past. "Truly," said the curate, who saw by the title it was the
Tears of Angelica, "I should have wept myself, had I caused such a
book to share the condemnation of the rest; for the author was not
only one of the best poets in Spain, but in the whole world, and
translated some of Ovid's fables with extraordinary success."
CHAPTER VII.
_Don Quixote's second sally in quest of adventures._
Full fifteen days did our knight remain quietly at home, without
betraying the least sign of his desire to renew his rambling; during
which time there passed a great deal of pleasant discourse between him
and his two friends, the curate and the barber; while he maintained,
that there was nothing the world stood so much in need of as
knights-errant; wherefore he was resolved to revive the order: in
which disputes Mr. Curate sometimes contradicted him, and sometimes
submitted; for had he not now and then given way to his fancies, there
would have been no conversing with him.
In the mean time Don Quixote solicited one of his neighbours, a
country labourer and honest fellow, though poor in purse as well as in
brains, to become his squire; in short, the knight talked long to him,
plied him with so many arguments, and made him so many fair promises,
that at last the poor silly clown consented to go along with him, and
be his squire. Among other inducements to entice him to do it
willingly, Don Quixote forgot not to tell him, that it was likely such
an adventure would present itself, as might secure him the conquest of
some island in the time that he might be picking up a straw or two,
and then the squire might promise himself to be made governor of the
place. Allured with these large promises, and many others, Sancho
Panza (for that was the name of the fellow) forsook his wife and
children to be his neighbour's squire.
This done, Don Quixote made it his business to furnish himself with
money; to which purpose, selling one house, mortgaging another, and
losing by all, he at last got a pretty good sum together. He also
borrowed a target of a friend; and having patched up his head-piece
and beaver as well as he could, he gave his squire notice of the day
and hour when he intended to set out, that he also might furnish
himself with what he thought necessary; but, above all, he charged him
to provide himself with a wallet; which Sancho promised to do, telling
him he would also take his ass along with him, which being a very good
one, might be a great ease to him, for he was not used to travel much
a-foot. The mentioning of the ass made the noble knight pause a while;
he mused and pondered whether he had ever read of any knight-errant,
whose squire used to ride upon an ass; but he could not remember any
precedent for it: however, he gave him leave at last to bring his ass,
hoping to mount him more honourably with the first opportunity, by
unhorsing the next discourteous knight he should meet. He also
furnished himself with linen, and as many other necessaries as he
could conveniently carry, according to the innkeeper's advice. Which
being done, Sancho Panza, without bidding either his wife or children
good-bye; and Don Quixote, without taking any more notice of his
housekeeper or of his niece, stole out of the village one night, not
so much as suspected by anybody, and made such haste, that by break of
day they thought themselves out of reach, should they happen to be
pursued. As for Sancho Panza, he rode like a patriarch, with his
canvass knapsack, or wallet, and his leathern bottle; having a huge
desire to see himself governor of the island, which his master had
promised him.
As they jogged on, "I beseech your worship, sir knight-errant," quoth
Sancho to his master, "be sure you don't forget what you promised me
about the island; for I dare say I shall make shift to govern it, let
it be never so big." "You must know, friend Sancho," replied Don
Quixote, "that it has been the constant practice of knights-errant in
former ages to make their squires governors of the islands or kingdoms
they conquered: now I am resolved to outdo my predecessors; for
whereas sometimes other knights delayed rewarding their squires till
they were grown old, and worn out with services, and then put them off
with some title, either of count, or at least marquis of some valley
or province, of great or small extent; now, if thou and I do but live,
it may happen, that before we have passed six days together, I may
conquer some kingdom, having many other kingdoms annexed to its
imperial crown; and this would fall out most luckily for thee; for
then would I presently crown thee king of one of them. Nor do thou
imagine this to be a mighty matter; for so strange accidents and
revolutions, so sudden and so unforeseen, attend the profession of
chivalry, that I might easily give thee a great deal more than I have
promised." "Why, should this come to pass," quoth Sancho Panza, "and I
be made a king by some such miracle as your worship says, then Mary
Gutierez would be at least a queen, and my children infantas and
princes, an't like your worship." "Who doubts of that?" cried Don
Quixote. "I doubt of it," replied Sancho Panza; "for I cannot help
believing, that though it should rain kingdoms down upon the face of
the earth, not one of them would sit well upon Mary Gutierez's head;
for I must needs tell you, she's not worth two brass jacks to make a
queen of: no, countess would be better for her; and that, too, will be
as much as she can handsomely manage." "Recommend the matter to
providence," returned Don Quixote; "'twill be sure to give what is
most expedient for thee."
CHAPTER VIII.
_Of the good success which the valorous Don Quixote had in the most
terrifying and incredible adventure of the Windmills, with other
transactions worthy to be transmitted to posterity._
As they were thus discoursing, they discovered some thirty or forty
windmills, in the plain; and as soon as the knight had spied them,
"Fortune," cried he, "directs our affairs better than we could have
wished: look yonder, Sancho, there are at least thirty outrageous
giants, whom I intend to encounter; and having deprived them of life,
we will begin to enrich ourselves with their spoils: for they are
lawful prize; and the extirpation of that cursed brood will be an
acceptable service to heaven." "What giants?" quoth Sancho Panza.
"Those whom thou see'st yonder," answered Don Quixote, "with their
long extended arms; some of that detested race have arms of so immense
a size that sometimes they reach two leagues in length." "Pray look
better, sir," quoth Sancho: "those things yonder are no giants, but
windmills, and the arms are their sails, which being whirled about by
the wind, make the mill go." "'Tis a sign," cried Don Quixote, "thou
art but little acquainted with adventures! I tell thee, they are
giants; and therefore if thou art afraid, go aside and say thy
prayers, for I am resolved to engage in combat with them all." This
said, he clapped spurs to his horse, without giving ear to his squire,
who bawled out to him, and assured him that they were windmills, and
no giants. But he was so fully possessed with a strong conceit of the
contrary, that he did not so much as hear his squire, nor was he
sensible of what they were, although he was already very near them.
"Stand, cowards!" cried he as loud as he could; "stand your ground,
ignoble creatures, and fly not basely from a single knight, who dares
encounter you all." At the same time the wind rising, the mill-sails
began to move, which, when Don Quixote spied, "Base miscreants," cried
he, "though you move more arms than the giant Briareus, you shall pay
for your arrogance." He most devoutly recommended himself to his Lady
Dulcinea, imploring her assistance in this perilous adventure; and so
covering himself with his shield, and couching his lance, he rushed
with Rozinante's utmost speed upon the first windmill he could come
at, and running his lance into the sail, the wind whirled it about
with such swiftness, that the rapidity of the motion presently broke
the lance into shivers, and hurled away both knight and horse along
with it, till down he fell, rolling a good way off in the field.
Sancho Panza ran as fast as his ass could drive to help his master,
whom he found lying, and not able to stir. "Did not I give your
worship fair warning?" cried he; "did not I tell you they were
windmills, and that nobody could think otherwise, unless he had also
windmills in his head?" "Peace, friend Sancho," replied Don Quixote;
"there is nothing so subject to the inconstancy of fortune as war. I
am verily persuaded, that cursed necromancer Freston, who carried away
my study and my books, has transformed these giants into windmills, to
deprive me of the honour of the victory; such is his inveterate malice
against me: but in the end, all his pernicious wiles and stratagems
shall prove ineffectual against the prevailing edge of my sword." "So
let it be," replied Sancho. And heaving him up again upon his legs,
once more the knight mounted poor Rozinante, who was half disjointed
with his fall.
[Illustration: DON QUIXOTE. P. 27.]
This adventure was the subject of their discourse, as they made the
best of their way towards the pass of Lapice; for Don Quixote took
that road, believing he could not miss of adventures in one so
mightily frequented.
Sancho desired him now to consider that it was high time to go to
dinner; but his master answered him, that he might eat whenever he
pleased; as for himself, he was not yet disposed to do so. Sancho
having obtained leave, fixed himself as orderly as he could upon his
ass; and taking some victuals out of his wallet, fell to munching
lustily; and ever and anon he lifted his bottle to his nose, and
fetched such hearty pulls, that it would have made the best-pampered
vintner in Malaga dry to have seen him.
In fine, they passed that night under some trees; from one of which
Don Quixote tore a withered branch, which in some sort was able to
serve him for a lance, and to this he fixed the head or spear of his
broken lance. But he did not sleep all that night, keeping his
thoughts intent on his dear Dulcinea, in imitation of what he had read
in books of chivalry, where the knights pass their time, without
sleep, in forests and deserts, wholly taken up with entertaining
thoughts of their absent ladies. The next day they went on directly
towards the pass of Lapice, which they discovered about three o'clock.
When they came near it, "Here it is, brother Sancho," said Don
Quixote, "that we may, as it were, thrust our arms up to the very
elbows in that which we call adventures. But let me give thee one
necessary caution; know, that though thou shouldst see me in the
greatest extremity of danger, thou must not offer to draw thy sword in
my defence, unless thou findest me assaulted by base plebeians and
vile scoundrels; for in such a case thou mayest assist thy master;
but if those with whom I am fighting are knights, thou must not do it;
for the laws of chivalry do not allow thee to encounter a knight till
thou art one thyself." "Never fear," quoth Sancho; "I'll be sure to
obey your worship in that, I'll warrant you; for I have ever loved
peace and quietness, and never cared to thrust myself into frays and
quarrels."
As they were talking, they spied coming towards them two monks of the
order of St. Benedict mounted on two dromedaries, for the mules on
which they rode were so high and stately, that they seemed little
less. After them came a coach, with four or five men on horseback, and
two muleteers on foot. There proved to be in the coach a Biscayan
lady, who was going to Seville to meet her husband, that was there in
order to embark for the Indies, to take possession of a considerable
post. Scarce had the Don perceived the monks, who were not of the same
company, though they went the same way, but he cried to his squire,
"Either I am deceived, or this will prove the most famous adventure
that ever was known; for without all question those two black things
that move towards us must be necromancers, that are carrying away by
force some princess in that coach; and 'tis my duty to prevent so
great an injury." "I fear me this will prove a worse job than the
windmills," quoth Sancho; "take warning, sir, and do not be led away a
second time." "I have already told thee, Sancho," replied Don Quixote,
"thou art miserably ignorant in matters of adventures: what I say is
true, and thou shalt find it so presently." This said, he spurred on
his horse, and posted himself just in the midst of the road where the
monks were to pass. And when they came within hearing, he immediately
cried out in a loud and haughty tone, "Release those high-born
princesses whom you are violently conveying away in the coach, or else
prepare to meet with instant death, as the just punishment of your
deeds." The monks stopped, no less astonished at the figure than at
the expressions of the speaker. "Sir knight," cried they, "we are no
such persons as you are pleased to term us, but religious men of the
order of St. Benedict, that travel about our affairs, and are wholly
ignorant whether or no there are any princesses carried away by force
in that coach." "I am not to be deceived," replied Don Quixote; "I
know you well enough, perfidious caitiffs:" and immediately, without
waiting their reply, he set spurs to Rozinante, and ran so furiously,
with his lance couched, against the first monk, that if he had not
prudently flung himself to the ground, the knight would certainly have
laid him either dead, or grievously wounded. The other observing this,
clapped his heels to his mule's flanks, and scoured over the plain as
if he had been running a race with the wind. Sancho no sooner saw the
monk fall, but he leapt off his ass, and running to him, began to
strip him immediately; but the two muleteers, who waited on the
monks, came up to him, and asked why he offered to strip him? Sancho
told them that this belonged to him as lawful plunder, being the
spoils won in battle by his lord and master Don Quixote. The fellows,
with whom there was no jesting, not knowing what he meant by his
spoils and battle, and seeing Don Quixote at a good distance in deep
discourse by the side of the coach, fell both upon poor Sancho, threw
him down, tore his beard from his chin, trampled on him, and there
left him lying without breath or motion. In the mean while the monk,
scared out of his wits and as pale as a ghost, got upon his mule again
as fast as he could, and spurred after his friend, who stayed for him
at a distance, expecting the issue of this strange adventure; but
being unwilling to stay to see the end of it, they made the best of
their way, making more signs of the cross than if the devil had been
posting after them.
Don Quixote was all this while engaged with the lady in the coach.
"Lady," cried he, "your discretion is now at liberty to dispose of
your beautiful self as you please; for the presumptuous arrogance of
those who attempted to enslave your person lies prostrate in the dust,
overthrown by this arm: and that you may not be at a loss for the name
of your deliverer, know I am called Don Quixote de la Mancha, by
profession a knight-errant and adventurer, captive to that peerless
beauty Donna Dulcinea del Toboso: nor do I desire any other recompense
for the service I have done you, but that you return to Toboso to
present yourself to that lady, and let her know what I have done to
purchase your deliverance." So saying he bade her courteously
farewell, and pursued his way.
CHAPTER IX.
_What passed between Don Quixote and the Goatherds._
After travelling the remainder of the day without further adventure,
they came to a place where some goatherds had set up some small huts;
and there they concluded to take up their lodging that night. This was
as great a mortification to Sancho, who was altogether for a good
town, as it was a pleasure to his master, who was for sleeping in the
open fields; and who believed that, as often as he did it, he
confirmed his title to knighthood by a new act of possession.
The knight was very courteously received by the goatherds; and as for
Sancho, after he had set up Rozinante and his ass as well as he could,
he presently repaired to the attractive smell of some pieces of kid's
flesh which stood boiling in a kettle over the fire. The hungry
squire would immediately have tried whether they were fit to be
removed out of the kettle into the stomach, but was not put to that
trouble; for the goatherds took them off the fire, and spread some
sheep-skins on the ground, and soon got their rural feast ready; and
cheerfully invited his master and him to partake of what they had.
Next, with some coarse compliment, after the country way, they desired
Don Quixote to sit down on a trough with the bottom upwards; and then
six of them, who were all that belonged to that fold, squatted them
down round the skins, while Sancho stood to wait upon his master, and
gave him drink in a horn cup, which the goatherds used. But he seeing
his man stand behind, said to him, "Sancho, it is my pleasure that
thou sit thee down by me, in the company of these good people, that
there be no difference now observed between thee and me, thy natural
lord and master; for it may be said of knight-errantry as of love,
that it makes all things equal." "I thank your worship," cried Sancho;
"but yet I must needs own, had I but a good deal of meat before me,
I'd eat it as well, or rather better, standing, and by myself, than if
I sat by an emperor; and, to deal plainly and truly with you, I had
rather munch a crust of brown bread and an onion in a corner, without
any more ado or ceremony, than feed upon turkey at another man's
table, where one is fain to sit mincing and chewing his meat an hour
together, drink little, be always wiping his fingers and his mouth,
and never dare to cough or sneeze, though he has never so much a mind
to it, nor do a many things which a body may do freely by one's self:
therefore, good sir, change those tokens of your kindness, which I
have a right to by being your worship's squire, into something that
may do me more good. As for these same honours, I heartily thank you
as much as if I had accepted them; but yet I give up my right to them
from this time to the world's end." "Talk no more," replied Don
Quixote, "but sit thee down, for the humble shall be exalted;" and so
pulling him by the arms, he forced him to sit by him.
All this while the goatherds said nothing, but stared upon their
guests; who swallowed whole luncheons as big as their fists with a
mighty appetite.
A young fellow, who used to bring them provisions from the next
village, happened to come while they were eating, and addressing
himself to the goatherds, "Hark ye, friends," said he, "d'ye hear the
news?" "What news?" cried one of the company. "That fine shepherd and
scholar Chrysostome died this morning," answered the other; "and they
say it was for love of Marcella, daughter of William the rich, that
goes up and down the country in the habit of a shepherdess." "For
Marcella!" cried one of the goatherds. "I say for her," replied the
fellow; "and what is more, it is reported he has ordered by his will
they should bury him in the fields like any heathen Moor, hard by the
cork-tree fountain, where they say he first saw her. Nay, he has
likewise ordered many other strange things to be done, which the
clergy cannot allow of; while Ambrose, the other scholar, who likewise
apparelled himself like a shepherd, is resolved to have his friend
Chrysostome's will fulfilled in every thing, just as he has ordered
it. It is thought that Ambrose and his friends will carry the day; and
to-morrow morning he is to be buried in great state where I told you:
I fancy it will be worth seeing; and I intend to go and see it, even
though I should not get back again to-morrow." "We will all go," cried
the goatherds, "and cast lots who shall tarry to look after the
goats." "Well said, Pedro," cried one of the goatherds; "but as for
casting of lots, I will save you that labour, for I will stay myself,
not so much out of kindness to you neither, or want of curiosity, as
because of the thorn in my toe, that will not let me go." Don Quixote,
who heard all this, entreated Pedro to tell him who the deceased was,
and also to give him a short account of the shepherdess.
Peter answered, that all he knew of the matter was, that the deceased
was a wealthy gentleman, who had been several years at the university
of Salamanca, and came home mightily improved in his learning. Within
some few months after he had left the university, on a certain morning
we saw him come dressed for all the world like a shepherd, and driving
his flock, having laid down the long gown, which he used to wear as a
scholar. At the same time one Ambrose, who had been his
fellow-scholar, also took upon him to go like a shepherd, and keep him
company, which we all did not a little marvel at. Somewhat before that
time Chrysostome's father died, and left him a large estate; and in
truth he deserved it all, for he was bountiful to the poor, a friend
to all honest people, and had a face like any blessing. At last it
came to be known, that the reason of his altering his garb in that
fashion was only that he might go up and down after that shepherdess
Marcella, whom our comrade told you of before, for he was fallen
mightily in love with her. And now I will tell you who this lady is.
You must know that there lived near us one William, a yeoman, who was
richer yet than Chrysostome's father; now he had no child but a
daughter; whose mother was as good a woman as ever went upon two legs:
methinks I see her yet standing afore me, with that blessed face of
hers. She was an excellent housewife, and did a deal of good among the
poor; for which, I believe, she is at this very time in paradise.
Alas, her death broke old William's heart; he soon followed her, poor
man, and left all to his little daughter, that Marcella by name,
giving charge of her to her uncle, the parson of our parish. When she
came to be fourteen or fifteen years of age, no man set his eyes on
her that did not bless heaven for having made her so handsome; so that
most men fell in love with her, and were ready to run mad for her. All
this while her uncle kept her very close: yet the report of her great
beauty and wealth spread far and near, insomuch that almost all the
young men in our town asked her of her uncle; nay, there flocked whole
droves of suitors, and the very best in the country too, who all
begged, and sued, and teazed her uncle to let them have her. But
though he'd have been glad to have got fairly rid of her, yet would
not he advise or marry her against her will; for he's a good man, I'll
say that for him, and a true Christian every inch of him, and scorns
to keep her from marrying to make a benefit of her estate; and, to his
praise be it spoken, he has been mainly commended for it more than
once, when the people of our parish meet together. "For I would have
you know, Sir Errant, that here in the country, and in our little
towns, there is not the least thing can be said or done but people
will talk and find fault: indeed, the parson must be essentially good
who could bring his whole parish to give him a good word." "Thou art
in the right," cried Don Quixote, "and therefore go on; for the story
is pleasant, and thou tellest it with a grace." "May I never want
God's grace," quoth Pedro, "for that is most to the purpose. But for
our parson, as I told you before, though he took care to let her know
of all those proposals, yet would she never answer otherwise, but that
she had no mind to wed as yet, as finding herself too young for the
burden of wedlock. But behold, when we least dreamed of it, the coy
lass must needs turn shepherdess; and neither her uncle, nor all those
of the village who advised her against it, could persuade her, but
away she went to the fields to keep her own sheep with the other young
lasses of the town. But then it was ten times worse; for no sooner was
she seen abroad, when I cannot tell how many spruce gallants, both
gentlemen and rich farmers, changed their garb for love of her, and
followed her up and down in shepherd's guise. One of them, as I have
told you, was this same Chrysostome, who now lies dead, of whom it is
said he not only loved, but worshipped her. In this way Marcella does
more harm in this country than the plague would do; for her
courteousness and fair looks draw on every body to love her; but then
her reserve and disdain break their hearts; and all they can do, poor
wretches, is to make a heavy complaint, and call her cruel, unkind,
ungrateful, and a world of such names, whereby they plainly shew what
a sad condition they are in: were you but to stay here some time, you
would hear these hills and valleys ring again with the doleful moans
of those she has denied, who yet have not courage to give over
following her. Here sighs one shepherd, there another moans; here is
one singing doleful ditties, there another is wringing his hands and
making woful complaints. And all this while the hard-hearted Marcella
never minds any one of them, and does not seem to be the least
concerned for them. We are all at a loss to know what will be the end
of all this pride and coyness, and who shall be the happy man that
shall at last succeed in taming her. Now, because there is nothing
more certain than all this, I am the more apt to give credit to what
our comrade has told us, as to the occasion of Chrysostome's death;
and therefore I would needs have you go and see him laid in his grave
to-morrow; which I believe will be worth your while, for he had many
friends, and it is not half a league to the place where it was his
will to be buried." "I intend to be there," answered Don Quixote; "and
in the mean time I return thee many thanks for the extraordinary
satisfaction this story has afforded me."
CHAPTER X.
_A continuation of the story of Marcella._
Scarce had day begun to appear from the balconies of the east, when
five of the goatherds got up, and having waked Don Quixote, asked him
if he held to his resolution of going to the funeral, whither they
were ready to bear him company. Thereupon the knight presently arose,
and ordered Sancho to get ready immediately; which he did with all
expedition, and then they set forwards. They had not gone a quarter of
a league before they saw advancing out of a cross path six shepherds
clad in black skins, their heads crowned with garlands of cypress and
bitter rose-bay-tree, with long holly-staves in their hands. Two
gentlemen on horseback, attended by three young lads on foot, followed
them: as they drew near, they saluted one another civilly, and after
the usual question,--"Which way do you travel?" they found they were
all going the same way, to see the funeral; and so they all joined
company. "I fancy, Senior Vivaldo," said one of the gentlemen,
addressing himself to the other, "we shall not think our time misspent
in going to see this famous funeral, for it must of necessity be very
extraordinary, according to the account which these men have given us
of the dead shepherd and his murdering shepherdess." "I am so far of
your opinion," answered Vivaldo, "that I would not stay one day, but a
whole week, rather than miss the sight." After this Vivaldo asked the
knight why he travelled so completely armed in so peaceable a country?
"My profession," answered the champion, "does not permit me to ride
otherwise. Luxurious feasts, sumptuous dresses, and downy ease, were
invented for effeminate courtiers; but labour, vigilance, and arms are
the portion of those whom the world calls knights-errant, of which
number I have the honour to be one, though the most unworthy." He
needed to say no more to satisfy them that his brains were out of
order; however, that they might the better understand the nature of
his folly, Vivaldo asked him what he meant by a knight-errant? "Have
you not read, then," cried Don Quixote, "the Annals and History of
Britain, where are recorded the famous deeds of King Arthur, who,
according to an ancient tradition in that kingdom, never died, but was
turned into a raven by enchantment, and shall one day resume his
former shape, and recover his kingdom again? For which reason, since
that time, the people of Great Britain dare not offer to kill a
raven."
After a great deal of conversation of this kind, the travellers were
sufficiently convinced of Don Quixote's frenzy. Nor were they less
surprised than were all those who had hitherto discovered so
unaccountable a distraction in one who seemed a rational creature.
However, Vivaldo, who was of a gay disposition, had no sooner made the
discovery than he resolved to make the best advantage of it that the
shortness of the way would allow him.
"Methinks, Sir Knight-errant," said he, "you have taken up one of the
strictest and most mortifying professions in the world. I do not think
but that even a Carthusian friar has a better time of it than you
have." "The profession of the Carthusian," answered Don Quixote, "may
be as austere, but ours is perhaps hardly less beneficial to the
world. We knights, like soldiers, execute what they pray for, and
procure those benefits to mankind, by the strength of our arms, and at
the hazard of our lives, for which they only intercede. Nor do we do
this sheltered from the injuries of the air, but under no other roof
than that of the wide heavens, exposed to summer's scorching heat, and
winter's pinching cold. However, gentlemen, do not imagine I would
insinuate as if the profession of a knight-errant was a state of
perfection equal to that of a holy recluse: I would only infer from
what I have said, and what I myself endure, that ours without question
is more laborious, more subject to the discipline of heavy blows, to
maceration, to the penance of hunger and thirst, and, in a word, to
rags, to want, and misery. For if you find that some knights-errant
have at last by their valour been raised to thrones and empires, you
may be sure it has been still at the expense of much sweat and blood.
And had even those happier knights been deprived of those assisting
sages and enchanters, who helped them in all emergencies, they would
have been strangely disappointed of their mighty expectations." "I am
of the same opinion," replied Vivaldo. "But one thing I would ask,
sir, since I understand it is so much the being of knight-errantry to
be in love, I presume you, who are of that profession, cannot be
without a mistress. And therefore, if you do not set up for secrecy,
give me leave to beg of you, in the name of all the company, that you
will be pleased so far to oblige us as to let us know the name and
quality of your lady, the place of her birth, and the charms of her
person. For, without doubt, she cannot but esteem herself fortunate in
being known to all the world to be the object of the wishes of a
knight so accomplished as yourself." With that Don Quixote, breathing
out a deep sigh, "I cannot tell," said he, "whether this lovely enemy
of my repose is the least affected with the world's being informed of
her power over my heart; all I dare say, in compliance with your
request is, that her name is Dulcinea, her country La Mancha, and
Toboso the happy place which she honours with her residence. As for
her quality, it cannot be less than princess, seeing she is my lady
and my queen. Her beauty transcends all the united charms of her whole
sex; even those chimerical perfections, which the hyperbolical
imaginations of poets in love have assigned to their mistresses, cease
to be incredible descriptions when applied to her, in whom all those
miraculous endowments are most divinely centred. The curling locks of
her bright flowing hair are purest gold; her smooth forehead the
Elysian plain; her brows are two celestial bows; her eyes two glorious
suns; her cheeks two beds of roses; her lips are coral; her teeth are
pearl; her neck is alabaster; her breasts marble; her hands ivory; and
snow would lose its whiteness near her bosom."
As they went on in this and like discourse, they saw, upon the hollow
road between the neighbouring mountains, about twenty shepherds more,
all accoutred in black skins, with garlands on their heads, which, as
they afterwards perceived, were all of yew or cyprus; six of them
carried a bier covered with several sorts of boughs and flowers: which
one of the goatherds espying, "Those are they," cried he, "that are
carrying poor Chrysostome to his grave; and it was in yonder hollow
that he gave charge they should bury his corpse." This made them all
double their pace, that they might get thither in time; and so they
arrived just as the bearers had set down the bier upon the ground, and
four of them had begun to open the ground with their spades at the
foot of a rock. They all saluted each other courteously, and condoled
their mutual loss; and then Don Quixote, with those who came with him,
went to view the bier; where they saw the dead body of a young man in
shepherd's weeds all strewed over with flowers. The deceased seemed to
be about thirty years old; and, dead as he was, it was easily
perceived that both his face and shape were extraordinarily handsome.
This doleful object so strangely filled all the company with sadness,
that not only the beholders, but also the grave-makers and the
mourning shepherds, remained a long time silent; till at last one of
the bearers, addressing himself to one of the rest, "Look, Ambrose,"
cried he, "whether this be the place which Chrysostome meant, since
you must needs have his will so punctually performed?" "This is the
very place," answered the other; "there it was that my unhappy friend
many times told me the sad story of his cruel fortune; and there it
was that he first saw that mortal enemy of mankind; there it was that
he made the first discovery of his passion, no less innocent than
violent; there it was that the relentless Marcella last denied,
shunned him, and drove him to that extremity of sorrow and despair
that hastened the sad catastrophe of his miserable life; and there it
was that, in token of so many misfortunes, he desired to be committed
to the bosom of the earth."
Then addressing himself to Don Quixote and the rest of the travellers,
"This body, gentlemen," said he, "which here you now behold, was once
enlivened by a soul which heaven had enriched with the greatest part
of its most valuable graces. This is the body of that Chrysostome who
was unrivalled in wit, matchless in courteousness, incomparable in
gracefulness, a phoenix in friendship, generous and magnificent
without ostentation, prudent and grave without pride, modest without
affectation, pleasant and complaisant without meanness; in a word, the
first in every thing good, though second to none in misfortune: he
loved well, and was hated; he adored, and was disdained; he begged
pity of cruelty itself; he strove to move obdurate marble; pursued the
wind; made his moans to solitary deserts; was constant to ingratitude;
and, for the recompense of his fidelity, became a prey to death in the
flower of his age, through the barbarity of a shepherdess, whom he
strove to immortalise by his verse; as these papers which are here
deposited might testify, had he not commanded me to sacrifice them to
the flames, at the same time that his body was committed to the
earth."
"Should you do so," cried Vivaldo, "you would appear more cruel to
them than their unhappy author. Consider, sir, 'tis not consistent
with discretion, nor even with justice, so nicely to perform the
request of the dead, when it is repugnant to reason. Augustus Caesar
himself would have forfeited his title to wisdom, had he permitted
that to have been effected which the divine Virgil had ordered by his
will. Therefore, sir, now that you resign your friend's body to the
grave, do not hurry thus the noble and only remains of that dear
unhappy man to a worse fate, the death of oblivion. What though he has
doomed them to perish in the height of his resentment, you ought not
indiscreetly to be their executioner; but rather reprieve and redeem
them from eternal silence, that they may live, and, flying through the
world, transmit to all ages the dismal story of your friend's virtue
and Marcella's ingratitude, as a warning to others, that they may
avoid such tempting snares and enchanting destructions; for not only
to me, but to all here present, is well known the history of your
enamoured and desperate friend: we are no strangers to the friendship
that was between you, as also to Marcella's cruelty which occasioned
his death. Last night being informed that he was to be buried here
to-day, moved not so much by curiosity as pity, we are come to behold
with our eyes that which gave us so much trouble to hear. Therefore,
in the name of all the company,--deeply affected like me, with a sense
of Chrysostome's extraordinary merit, and his unhappy fate, and
desirous to prevent such deplorable disasters for the future,--I beg
that you will permit me to save some of these papers, whatever you
resolve to do with the rest." And so, without waiting for an answer,
he stretched out his arm, and took out those papers which lay next to
his hand. "Well, sir," said Ambrose, "you have found a way to make me
submit, and you may keep those papers; but for the rest, nothing shall
make me alter my resolution of burning them." Vivaldo said no more;
but being impatient to see what those papers were which he had rescued
from the flames, he opened one of them immediately, and read the title
of it, which was, 'The despairing Lover.' "That," said Ambrose, "was
the last piece my dear friend ever wrote; and therefore, that you may
all hear to what a sad condition his unhappy passion had reduced him,
read it aloud, I beseech you, sir, while the grave is making." "With
all my heart," replied Vivaldo; and so the company, having the same
desire, presently gathered round about him while he read the lines.
The verses were well approved by all the company; and Vivaldo was
about to read another paper, when they were unexpectedly prevented by
a kind of apparition that offered itself to their view. It was
Marcella herself, who appeared at the top of the rock, at the foot of
which they were digging the grave; but so beautiful, that fame seemed
rather to have lessened than to have magnified her charms: those who
had never seen her before gazed on her with silent wonder and delight;
nay, those who used to see her every day seemed no less lost in
admiration than the rest. But scarce had Ambrose spied her, when, with
anger and indignation in his heart, he cried out, "What dost thou
there, thou cruel basilisk of these mountains? comest thou to see
whether the wounds of thy unhappy victim will bleed afresh at thy
presence? or comest thou to glory in the fatal effects of thy
inhumanity, like another Nero at the sight of flaming Rome?" "I come
not here to any of those ungrateful ends, Ambrose," replied Marcella;
"but only to clear my innocence, and shew the injustice of all those
who lay their misfortunes and Chrysostome's death to my charge:
therefore, I entreat you all who are here at this time to hear me a
little, for I shall not need to use many words to convince people of
sense of an evident truth. Heaven, you are pleased to say, has made me
beautiful, and that to such a degree that you are forced, nay, as it
were, compelled to love me, in spite of your endeavours to the
contrary; and for the sake of that love, you say I ought to love you
again. Now, though I am sensible that whatever is beautiful is lovely,
I cannot conceive that what is loved for being handsome should be
bound to love that by which it is loved merely because it is loved. He
that loves a beautiful object may happen to be ugly; and as what is
ugly deserves not to be loved, it would be ridiculous to say, I love
you because you are handsome, and therefore you must love me again
though I am ugly. But suppose two persons of different sexes are
equally handsome, it does not follow that their desires should be
alike and reciprocal; for all beauties do not kindle love; some only
recreate the sight, and never reach nor captivate the heart. Alas,
should whatever is beautiful produce love, and enslave the mind,
mankind's desires would ever run confused and wandering, without being
able to fix their determinate choice; for as there is an infinite
number of beautiful objects, the desires would consequently be also
infinite; whereas, on the contrary, I have heard that true love is
still confined to one, and is voluntary and unforced. This being
granted, why would you have me force my inclinations for no other
reason but that you say you love me? Tell me, I beseech you, had
Heaven formed me as ugly as it has made me beautiful, could I justly
complain of you for not loving me? Pray consider also, that I do not
possess those charms by choice; such as they are, they were freely
bestowed on me by Heaven: and as the viper is not to be blamed for the
poison with which she kills, seeing it was assigned her by nature, so
I ought not to be censured for that beauty which I derive from the
same cause; for beauty in a virtuous woman is but like a distant
flame, or a sharp-edged sword, and only burns and wounds those who
approach too near it. Honour and virtue are the ornaments of the soul,
and that body that is destitute of them cannot be esteemed beautiful,
though it be naturally so. If, then, honour be one of those endowments
which most adorn the body, why should she that is beloved for her
beauty expose herself to the loss of it, merely to gratify the
inclinations of one who, for his own selfish ends, uses all the means
imaginable to make her lose it? I was born free, and, that I might
continue so, I retired to these solitary hills and plains, where trees
are my companions, and clear fountains my looking-glasses. With the
trees and with the waters I communicate my thoughts and my beauty. I
am a distant flame, and a sword far off: those whom I have attracted
with my sight I have undeceived with my words; and if hope be the food
of desire, as I never gave any encouragement to Chrysostome, nor to
any other, it may well be said, it was rather his own obstinacy than
my cruelty that shortened his life. If you tell me that his intentions
were honest, and therefore ought to have been complied with, I answer,
that when, at the very place where his grave is making, he discovered
his passion, I told him I was resolved to live and die single, and
that the earth alone should reap the fruit of my reservedness and
enjoy the spoils of my beauty; and if, after all the admonitions I
gave him, he would persist in his obstinate pursuit, and sail against
the wind, what wonder is it he should perish in the waves of his
indiscretion? Had I ever encouraged him, or amused him with ambiguous
words, then I had been false; and had I gratified his wishes, I had
acted contrary to my better resolves: he persisted, though I had given
him a due caution, and he despaired without being hated. Now I leave
you to judge whether I ought to be blamed for his sufferings. If I
have deceived any one, let him complain; if I have broke my promise to
any one, let him despair; if I encourage any one, let him presume; if
I entertain any one, let him boast: but let no man call me cruel nor
murderer until I either deceive, break my promise, encourage, or
entertain him. Let him that calls me a tigress and a basilisk avoid me
as a dangerous thing; and let him that calls me ungrateful give over
serving me: I assure them I will never seek nor pursue them. Therefore
let none hereafter make it their business to disturb my ease, nor
strive to make me hazard among men the peace I now enjoy, which I am
persuaded is not to be found with them. I have wealth enough; I
neither love nor hate any one; the innocent conversation of the
neighbouring shepherdesses, with the care of my flocks, help me to
pass away my time, without either coquetting with this man, or
practising arts to ensnare that other. My thoughts are limited by
these mountains; and if they wander further, it is only to admire the
beauty of heaven, and thus by steps to raise my soul towards her
original dwelling."
As soon as she had said this, without waiting for any answer, she left
the place, and ran into the thickest of the adjoining wood, leaving
all that heard her charmed with her discretion, as well as her beauty.
However, so prevalent were the charms of the latter that some of the
company, who were desperately struck, could not forbear offering to
follow her, without being in the least deterred by the solemn
protestations which they had heard her make that very moment. But Don
Quixote perceiving their design, and believing he had now a fit
opportunity to exert his knight-errantry; "Let no man," cried he, "of
what quality or condition soever, presume to follow the fair Marcella,
under the penalty of incurring my displeasure. She has made it appear,
by undeniable reasons, that she was not guilty of Chrysostome's death;
and has positively declared her firm resolution never to condescend to
the desires of any of her admirers: for which reason, instead of being
importuned and persecuted, she ought to be esteemed and honoured by
all good men, as being one of the few women in the world who have
lived with such a virtuous reservedness."
Now, whether it were that Don Quixote's threats terrified them, or
that Ambrose's persuasion prevailed with them to stay and see their
friend interred, none of the shepherds left the place, till the grave
being made, and the papers burnt, the body was deposited in the bosom
of the earth, not without many tears from all the assistants. They
covered the grave with a great stone, and strewed upon it many flowers
and boughs; and every one having condoled a while with his friend
Ambrose, they took their leave of him, and departed. Vivaldo and his
companion did the like; as did also Don Quixote, who was not a person
to forget himself on such occasions; he likewise bid adieu to the kind
goatherds that had entertained him, and to the two travellers, who
desired him to go with them to Seville, assuring him there was no
place in the world more fertile in adventures, every street and every
corner there producing some. Don Quixote returned them thanks for
their kind information, but told them, "he neither would nor ought to
go to Seville till he had cleared all those mountains of the thieves
and robbers which he heard very much infested all those parts."
Thereupon the travellers, being unwilling to divert him from so good a
design, took their leaves of him once more, and pursued their journey,
sufficiently supplied with matter to discourse on from the story of
Marcella and Chrysostome, and the follies of Don Quixote.
The knight and his squire continued their journey, and on quitting an
inn, which, notwithstanding the remonstrances of Sancho, the Don, as
usual, insisted was a castle, all the people in the yard, above twenty
in number, stood gazing at him; and, among the rest, the host's
daughter, while he on his part removed not his eyes from her, and ever
and anon sent forth a sigh, which seemed to proceed from the bottom of
his heart.
Being now both mounted, and at the door of the inn, he called to the
host, and, in a grave and solemn tone of voice, said to him: "Many and
great are the favours, signor governor, which in this your castle I
have received, and I am bound to be grateful to you all the days of my
life. If I can make you some compensation by taking vengeance on any
proud miscreant who hath insulted you, know that the duty of my
profession is no other than to strengthen the weak, to revenge the
injured, and to chastise the perfidious. Consider, and if your memory
recall anything of this nature to recommend to me, you need only
declare it; for I promise you, by the order of knighthood I have
received, to procure you satisfaction and amends to your heart's
desire!" The host answered with the same gravity: "Sir knight, I have
no need of your worship's avenging any wrong for me; I know how to
take the proper revenge when any injury is done me: all I desire of
your worship is, to pay me for what you have had in the inn, as well
for the straw and barley for your two beasts as for your supper and
lodging." "What! is this an inn?" exclaimed Don Quixote. "Ay, and a
very creditable one," answered the host. "Hitherto, then, I have been
in an error," answered Don Quixote; "for in truth I took it for a
castle; but since it is indeed no castle, but an inn, all that you
have now to do is to excuse the payment; for I cannot act contrary to
the law of knights-errant, of whom I certainly know (having hitherto
read nothing to the contrary) that they never paid for lodging or
anything else in the inns where they reposed; because every
accommodation is legally and justly due to them, in return for the
insufferable hardships they endure while in quest of adventures, by
night and by day, in winter and in summer, on foot and on horseback,
with thirst and with hunger, with heat and with cold; subject to all
the inclemencies of heaven, and to all the inconveniences of earth."
"I see little to my purpose in all this," answered the host; "pay me
what is my due, and let us have none of your stories and
knight-errantries; all I want is to get my own." "Thou art a
blockhead, and a pitiful innkeeper," answered Don Quixote: so clapping
spurs to Rozinante, and brandishing his lance, he sallied out of the
inn without opposition, and, never turning to see whether his squire
followed him, was soon a good way off.
The host, seeing him go without paying, ran to seize on Sancho Panza,
who said that, since his master would not pay, neither would he pay;
for being squire to a knight-errant, the same rule and reason held as
good for him as for his master. The innkeeper, irritated on hearing
this, threatened, that if he did not pay him, he should repent his
obstinacy.
Poor Sancho's ill-luck would have it that, among the people in the
inn, there were four clothworkers of Segovia, three needle-makers from
the fountain of Cordova, and two neighbours from the market-place of
Seville,--frolicksome fellows, who, instigated and moved by the
self-same spirit, came up to Sancho, and, having dismounted him, one
of them produced a blanket from the landlord's bed, into which he was
immediately thrown; but, perceiving that the ceiling was too low, they
determined to execute their purpose in the yard, which was bounded
above only by the sky. Thither Sancho was carried; and, being placed
in the middle of the blanket, they began to toss him aloft, and divert
themselves with him as with a dog at Shrovetide. The cries which the
poor blanketed squire sent forth were so many and so loud that they
reached his master's ears; who, stopping to listen attentively,
believed that some new adventure was at hand, until he plainly
recognised the voice of his squire; then turning the reins, he
perceived the wicked sport they were making with his squire. He saw
him ascend and descend through the air with so much grace and agility,
that, if his indignation would have suffered him, he certainly would
have laughed outright. But they suspended neither their laughter nor
their labour; nor did the flying Sancho cease to pour forth
lamentations, mingled now with threats, now with entreaties; yet all
were of no avail, and they desisted at last only from pure fatigue.
They then brought him his ass, and, wrapping him in his cloak, mounted
him thereon. The compassionate maid of the inn, seeing him so
exhausted, bethought of helping him to a jug of water, and that it
might be the cooler, she fetched it from the well. Sancho took it, and
instantly began to drink; but at the first sip, finding it was water,
he would proceed no further, and besought Maritornes to bring him some
wine, which she did willingly, and paid for it with her own money; for
it is indeed said of her that, although in that station, she had some
faint traces of a Christian. When Sancho had ceased drinking, he
clapped heels to his ass; and, the inn-gate being thrown wide open,
out he went, satisfied that he had paid nothing, and had carried his
point, though at the expense of his usual pledge, namely, his back.
The landlord, it is true, retained his wallets in payment of what was
due to him; but Sancho never missed them in the hurry of his
departure. The innkeeper would have fastened the door well after him,
as soon as he saw him out; but the blanketeers would not let him,
being persons of that sort that, though Don Quixote had really been
one of the knights of the round table, they would not have cared two
farthings for him.
Sancho came up to his master so faint and dispirited that he was not
able to urge his ass forward. Don Quixote, perceiving him in that
condition, said: "Honest Sancho, that castle, or inn, I am now
convinced, is enchanted; for they who so cruelly sported with thee,
what could they be but phantoms and inhabitants of another world? And
I am confirmed in this from having found that, when I stood at the
pales of the yard, beholding the acts of your sad tragedy, I could not
possibly get over them, nor even alight from Rozinante; so that they
must certainly have held me enchanted. If I could have got over, or
alighted, I would have avenged thee in such a manner as would have
made those poltroons and assassins remember the jest as long as they
lived, even though I should have thereby transgressed the laws of
chivalry; for, as I have often told thee, they do not allow a knight
to lay hand on his sword against any one who is not so, unless it be
in defence of his own life and person, and in cases of urgent and
extreme necessity." "And I too," quoth Sancho, "would have revenged
myself if I had been able, knight or no knight, but I could not;
though, in my opinion, they who diverted themselves at my expense were
no hobgoblins, but men of flesh and bones, as we are; and each of
them, as I heard while they were tossing me, had his proper name; so
that, sir, as to your not being able to leap over the pales, nor to
alight from your horse, the fault lay not in enchantment, but in
something else. And what I gather clearly from all this is, that these
adventures we are in quest of will in the long-run bring us into so
many misadventures that we shall not know which is our right foot. So
that, in my poor opinion, the better and surer way would be to return
to our village, now that it is reaping-time, and look after our
business, nor go rambling thus out of the frying-pan into the fire."
"How little dost thou know, Sancho," answered Don Quixote, "of what
appertains to chivalry! Peace, and have patience; for the day will
come when thine eyes shall witness how honourable a thing it is to
follow this profession. For tell me what greater satisfaction can the
world afford, or what pleasure can be compared with that of winning a
battle, and triumphing over an adversary? Undoubtedly none." "It may
be so," answered Sancho, "though I do not know it. I only know that
since we have been knights-errant, or since you have been one, sir
(for I have no right to reckon myself of that honourable number), we
have never won any battle; we have had nothing but drubbings upon
drubbings, cuffs upon cuffs, with my blanket-tossing into the bargain,
and that by persons enchanted, on whom I cannot revenge myself, and
thereby know what that pleasure of overcoming an enemy is which your
worship talks of." "That is what troubles me, and ought to trouble
thee also, Sancho," answered Don Quixote; "but henceforward I will
endeavour to have ready at hand a sword made with such art that no
kind of enchantment can touch him that wears it; and perhaps fortune
may put me in possession of that of Amadis, when he called himself
'Knight of the Burning Sword,' which was one of the best weapons that
ever was worn by knight; for, beside the virtue aforesaid, it cut like
a razor; and no armour, however strong or enchanted, could withstand
it." "Such is my luck," quoth Sancho, "that though this were so, and
your worship should find such a sword, it would be of service only to
those who are dubbed knights; as for the poor squires, they may sing
sorrow." "Fear not, Sancho," said Don Quixote; "Heaven will deal more
kindly by thee."
The knight and his squire went on conferring thus together, when Don
Quixote perceived, in the road on which they were travelling, a great
and thick cloud of dust coming towards them; upon which he turned to
Sancho, and said, "This is the day, O Sancho, that shall manifest the
good that fortune hath in store for me. This is the day, I say, on
which shall be proved, as at all times, the valour of my arm; and on
which I shall perform exploits that will be recorded and written in
the book of fame, there to remain to all succeeding ages. Seest thou
that cloud of dust, Sancho? It is raised by a prodigious army of
divers nations, who are on the march this way." "If so, there must be
two armies," said Sancho; "for here, on this side, arises just another
cloud of dust." Don Quixote turned, and seeing that it really was so,
he rejoiced exceedingly, taking it for granted they were two armies
coming to engage in the midst of that spacious plain; for at all hours
and moments his imagination was full of the battles, enchantments,
adventures, extravagances, combats, and challenges detailed in his
favourite books; and in every thought, word, and action he reverted to
them. Now the cloud of dust he saw was raised by two great flocks of
sheep going the same road from different parts, and as the dust
concealed them until they came near, and Don Quixote affirmed so
positively that they were armies, Sancho began to believe it, and
said, "Sir, what then must we do?" "What," replied Don Quixote, "but
favour and assist the weaker side? Thou must know, Sancho, that the
army which marches towards us in front is led and commanded by the
great Emperor Alifanfaron, lord of the great island of Taprobana: this
other, which marches behind us, is that of his enemy, the king of the
Garamantes, Pentapolin of the Naked Arm--for he always enters into
battle with his right arm bare." "But why do these two princes bear
one another so much ill-will?" demanded Sancho. "They hate one
another," answered Don Quixote, "because this Alifanfaron is a furious
pagan, in love with the daughter of Pentapolin, who is most beautiful,
and also a Christian; but her father will not give her in marriage to
the pagan king unless he will first renounce the religion of his false
prophet Mahomet, and turn Christian." "By my beard," said Sancho,
"Pentapolin is in the right; and I am resolved to assist him to the
utmost of my power." "Therein wilt thou do thy duty, Sancho," said Don
Quixote; "but listen with attention whilst I give thee an account of
the principal knights in the two approaching armies; and, that thou
mayest observe them the better, let us retire to that rising ground,
whence both armies may be distinctly seen." Seeing, however, in his
imagination, what did not exist, he began, with a loud voice, to say:
"The knight thou seest yonder with the gilded armour, who bears on his
shield a lion crowned, couchant at a damsel's feet, is the valorous
Laurcalco, Lord of the Silver Bridge. The other, with the armour
flowered with gold, who bears three crowns argent, in a field azure,
is the formidable Micocolembo, Grand Duke of Quiracia. The third, with
gigantic limbs, who marches on his right, is the undaunted
Brandabarbaran of Boliche, Lord of the three Arabias. He is armed with
a serpent's skin, and bears, instead of a shield, a gate, which fame
says is one of those belonging to the temple which Samson pulled down
when with his death he avenged himself upon his enemies."
In this manner he went on naming sundry knights of each squadron, as
his fancy dictated, and giving to each their arms, colours, devices,
and mottos, extempore; and, without pausing, he continued thus: "That
squadron in the front is formed and composed of people of different
nations. Here stand those who drink the sweet waters of the famous
Xanthus; the mountaineers who tread the Massilian fields; those who
sift the pure and fine gold-dust of Arabia Felix; those who dwell
along the famous and refreshing banks of the clear Thermodon; those
who drain, by divers and sundry ways, the golden veins of Pactolus;
the Numidians, unfaithful in their promises; the Persians, famous for
bows and arrows; the Parthians and Medes, who fight flying; the
Arabians, perpetually changing their habitations; the Scythians, as
cruel as fair; the broad-lipped Ethiopians; and an infinity of other
nations, whose countenances I see and know, although I cannot
recollect their names."
How many provinces did he name! how many nations did he enumerate,
giving to each, with wonderful readiness, its peculiar attributes!
Sancho Panza stood confounded at his discourse, without speaking a
word; and now and then he turned his head about, to see whether he
could discover the knights and giants his master named. But seeing
none, he said, "Sir, not a man, or giant, or knight, of all you have
named, can I see any where." "How sayest thou, Sancho?" answered Don
Quixote; "hearest thou not the neighing of the steeds, the sound of
the trumpets, and the rattling of the drums?" "I hear nothing,"
answered Sancho, "but the bleating of sheep and lambs:" and so it was;
for now the two flocks were come very near them. "Thy fears, Sancho,"
said Don Quixote, "prevent thee from hearing or seeing aright; for one
effect of fear is to disturb the senses and make things not to appear
what they really are: and if thou art so much afraid, retire and leave
me alone; for with my single arm I shall ensure victory to that side
which I favour with my assistance:" then, clapping spurs to Rozinante,
and setting his lance in his rest, he darted down the hillock like
lightning. Sancho cried out to him: "Hold, Signor Don Quixote, come
back! they are only lambs and sheep you are going to encounter; pray
come back; what madness is this! there is neither giant, nor knight,
nor horses, nor arms, nor shields quartered or entire, nor true
azures, nor devices: what are you doing, sir?" Notwithstanding all
this, Don Quixote turned not again, but still went on, crying aloud,
"Ho, knights, you that follow and fight under the banner of the
valiant Emperor Pentapolin of the Naked Arm, follow me all, and you
shall see with how much ease I revenge him on his enemy Alifanfaron of
Taprobana." With these words he rushed into the midst of the squadron
of sheep, as courageously and intrepidly as if in good earnest he was
engaging his mortal enemies. The shepherds and herdsmen who came with
the flocks called out to him to desist; but seeing it was to no
purpose, they unbuckled their slings, and began to salute his ears
with a shower of stones. Don Quixote cared not for the stones, but,
galloping about on all sides, cried out: "Where art thou, proud
Alifanfaron? Present thyself before me; I am a single knight, desirous
to prove thy valour hand to hand, and to punish thee with the loss of
life for the wrong thou dost to the valiant Pentapolin Garamanta." At
that instant a large stone struck him with such violence that he
believed himself either slain or sorely wounded; and remembering some
balsam which he had, he pulled out the cruse, and applying it to his
mouth, began to swallow some of the liquor; but before he could take
what he thought sufficient, another hit him full on the hand, and
dashed the cruse to pieces: carrying off three or four of his teeth by
the way, and grievously bruising two of his fingers. Such was the
first blow, and such the second, that the poor knight fell from his
horse to the ground. The shepherds ran to him, and verily believed
they had killed him; whereupon in all haste they collected their
flock, took up their dead, which were about seven, and marched off
without farther inquiry.
All this while Sancho stood upon the hillock, beholding his master's
actions--tearing his beard, and cursing the unfortunate hour and
moment that ever he knew him. But seeing him fallen to the ground and
the shepherds gone off, he descended from the hillock, and, running to
him, found him in a very ill plight, though not quite bereaved of
sense; and said to him, "Did I not beg you, Signor Don Quixote, to
come back; for those you went to attack were a flock of sheep, and not
an army of men?" "How easily," replied Don Quixote, "can that thief of
an enchanter, my enemy, transform things or make them invisible!
However, do one thing, Sancho, for my sake, to undeceive thyself, and
see the truth of what I tell thee; mount thy ass, and follow them fair
and softly, and thou wilt find that, when they are got a little
farther off, they will return to their first form, and, ceasing to be
sheep, will become men, proper and tall, as I described them at first.
But do not go now; for I want thy assistance; come hither to me, and
see how many of my teeth are deficient; for it seems to me that I have
not one left in my head."
He now raised himself up, and placing his left hand on his mouth, to
prevent the remainder of his teeth from falling out, with the other he
laid hold on Rozinante's bridle, who had not stirred from his master's
side, such was his fidelity, and went towards his squire, who stood
leaning with his breast upon the ass, and his cheek reclining upon his
hand, in the posture of a man overwhelmed with thought. Don Quixote,
seeing him thus, and to all appearance so melancholy, said to him,
"Know, Sancho, that one man is no more than another, only inasmuch as
he does more than another. So do not afflict thyself for the
mischances that befall me, since thou hast no share in them." "How? no
share in them!" answered Sancho; "peradventure he they tossed in a
blanket yesterday was not my father's son, and the wallets I have lost
to-day, with all my movables, belong to somebody else?" "What! are the
wallets lost?" quoth Don Quixote. "Yes, they are," answered Sancho.
"Then we have nothing to eat to-day?" replied Don Quixote. "It would
be so," answered Sancho, "if these fields did not produce those herbs
which your worship says you know, and with which unlucky
knights-errant like your worship are used to supply such wants."
"Nevertheless," said Don Quixote, "at this time I would rather have a
slice of bread and a couple of heads of salt pilchards than all the
herbs described by Dioscorides, though commented upon by Doctor Laguna
himself. But, good Sancho, get upon thy ass, and follow me; for God,
who provides for all, will not desert us, since he neglects neither
the birds of the air, the beasts of the earth, nor the fish of the
waters; more especially being engaged, as we are, in his service."
"Your worship," said Sancho, "would make a better preacher than a
knight-errant." "Sancho," said Don Quixote, "the knowledge of
knights-errant must be universal; there have been knights-errant, in
times past, who would make sermons or harangues on the king's highway
as successfully as if they had taken their degrees in the university
of Paris; whence it may be inferred that the lance never blunted the
pen, nor the pen the lance." "Well, be it as your worship says,"
answered Sancho; "but let us begone hence, and endeavour to get a
lodging to-night; and pray God it be where there are neither blankets
or blanket-heavers, hobgoblins or enchanted Moors."
CHAPTER XI.
_The sage discourse continued, with the adventures of a dead body._
Thus discoursing, night overtook them, and they were still in the high
road; and the worst of it was, they were famished with hunger: for
with their wallets they had lost their whole larder of provisions,
and, to complete their misfortunes, an adventure now befell them which
appeared indeed to be truly an adventure. The night came on rather
dark; notwithstanding which they saw advancing towards them a great
number of lights, resembling so many moving stars. Sancho stood aghast
at the sight of them, nor was Don Quixote unmoved. The one checked his
ass, and the other his horse, and both stood looking before them with
eager attention. They perceived that the lights were advancing towards
them, and that as they approached nearer they appeared larger. "I
beseech thee, Sancho, to be of good courage; for experience shall give
thee sufficient proof of mine." "I will, if it please God," answered
Sancho; and, retiring a little on one side of the road, and again
endeavouring to discover what those walking lights might be, they soon
after perceived a great many persons clothed in white; this dreadful
spectacle completely annihilated the courage of Sancho, whose teeth
began to chatter, as if seized with a quartan ague. But it was
otherwise with his master, whose lively imagination instantly
suggested to him that this must be truly a chivalrous adventure. He
conceived that the litter was a bier, whereon was carried some knight
sorely wounded or slain, whose revenge was reserved for him alone. He
therefore, without delay, couched his spear, seated himself firm in
his saddle, and, with grace and spirit, advanced into the middle of
the road by which the procession must pass; and when they were near he
raised his voice, and said: "Ho! knights, whoever ye are, halt, and
give me an account to whom ye belong, whence ye come, whither ye are
going, and what it is ye carry upon that bier; for, in all appearance,
either ye have done some injury to others, or others to you; and it is
expedient and necessary that I be informed of it, either to chastise
ye for the evil ye have done, or to revenge ye of wrongs sustained."
"We are in haste," answered one in the procession; "the inn is a great
way off; and we cannot stay to give so long an account as you
require:" then, spurring his mule, he passed forward. Don Quixote,
highly resenting this answer, laid hold of his bridle, and said,
"Stand, and with more civility give me the account I demand; otherwise
I challenge ye all to battle." The mule was timid, and started so much
upon his touching the bridle, that, rising on her hind-legs, she threw
her rider over the crupper to the ground. A lacquey that came on foot,
seeing the man in white fall, began to revile Don Quixote; whose
choler being now raised, he couched his spear, and immediately
attacking one of the mourners, laid him on the ground grievously
wounded; then turning about to the rest, it was worth seeing with what
agility he attacked and defeated them; it seemed as if wings at that
instant had sprung on Rozinante--so lightly and swiftly he moved! All
the white-robed people, being timorous and unarmed, soon quitted the
skirmish, and ran over the plain with their lighted torches, looking
like so many masqueraders on a carnival or a festival night. The
mourners were so wrapped up and muffled in their long robes that they
could make no exertion; so that the Don, with entire safety to
himself, assailed them all, and, sorely against their will, obliged
them to quit the field; for they thought him no man, but the devil
broke loose upon them to seize the dead body they were conveying in
the litter.
All this Sancho beheld, with admiration at his master's intrepidity,
and said to himself, "This master of mine is certainly as valiant and
magnanimous as he pretends to be." A burning torch lay on the ground,
near the first whom the mule had overthrown; by the light of which Don
Quixote espied him, and going up to him placed the point of his spear
to his throat, commanding him to surrender, on pain of death. To which
the fallen man answered, "I am surrendered enough already, since I
cannot stir, for one of my legs is broken. I beseech you, sir, if you
are a Christian gentleman, do not kill me; you would commit a great
sacrilege; for I am a licentiate, and have taken the lesser orders."
"What, then, I pray you," said Don Quixote, "brought you hither, being
an ecclesiastic?" "What, sir?" replied the fallen man, "but my evil
fortune." "A worse fate now threatens you," said Don Quixote, "unless
you reply satisfactorily to all my first questions." "Your worship
shall soon be satisfied," answered the licentiate; "and therefore you
must know, sir, that, though I told you before that I was a
licentiate, I am, in fact, only a bachelor of arts, and my name is
Alonzo Lopez. I am a native of Alcovendas, and came from the city of
Baeza, with eleven more ecclesiastics, the same who fled with the
torches; we were attending the corpse in that litter to the city of
Segovia: it is that of a gentleman who died in Baeza, where he was
deposited till now that, as I said before, we are carrying his bones
to their place of burial in Segovia, where he was born." "And who
killed him?" demanded Don Quixot
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