CHAPTER LV — OF WHAT BEFELL SANCHO ON THE ROAD, AND OTHER THINGS THAT CANNOT BE — SURPASSED

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The length of time he delayed with Ricote prevented Sancho from
reaching the duke’s castle that day, though he was within half a league
of it when night, somewhat dark and cloudy, overtook him. This,
however, as it was summer time, did not give him much uneasiness, and
he turned aside out of the road intending to wait for morning; but his
ill luck and hard fate so willed it that as he was searching about for
a place to make himself as comfortable as possible, he and Dapple fell
into a deep dark hole that lay among some very old buildings. As he
fell he commended himself with all his heart to God, fancying he was
not going to stop until he reached the depths of the bottomless pit;
but it did not turn out so, for at little more than thrice a man’s
height Dapple touched bottom, and he found himself sitting on him
without having received any hurt or damage whatever. He felt himself
all over and held his breath to try whether he was quite sound or had a
hole made in him anywhere, and finding himself all right and whole and
in perfect health he was profuse in his thanks to God our Lord for the
mercy that had been shown him, for he made sure he had been broken into
a thousand pieces. He also felt along the sides of the pit with his
hands to see if it were possible to get out of it without help, but he
found they were quite smooth and afforded no hold anywhere, at which he
was greatly distressed, especially when he heard how pathetically and
dolefully Dapple was bemoaning himself, and no wonder he complained,
nor was it from ill-temper, for in truth he was not in a very good
case. “Alas,” said Sancho, “what unexpected accidents happen at every
step to those who live in this miserable world! Who would have said
that one who saw himself yesterday sitting on a throne, governor of an
island, giving orders to his servants and his vassals, would see
himself to-day buried in a pit without a soul to help him, or servant
or vassal to come to his relief? Here must we perish with hunger, my
ass and myself, if indeed we don’t die first, he of his bruises and
injuries, and I of grief and sorrow. At any rate I’ll not be as lucky
as my master Don Quixote of La Mancha, when he went down into the cave
of that enchanted Montesinos, where he found people to make more of him
than if he had been in his own house; for it seems he came in for a
table laid out and a bed ready made. There he saw fair and pleasant
visions, but here I’ll see, I imagine, toads and adders. Unlucky wretch
that I am, what an end my follies and fancies have come to! They’ll
take up my bones out of this, when it is heaven’s will that I’m found,
picked clean, white and polished, and my good Dapple’s with them, and
by that, perhaps, it will be found out who we are, at least by such as
have heard that Sancho Panza never separated from his ass, nor his ass
from Sancho Panza. Unlucky wretches, I say again, that our hard fate
should not let us die in our own country and among our own people,
where if there was no help for our misfortune, at any rate there would
be someone to grieve for it and to close our eyes as we passed away! O
comrade and friend, how ill have I repaid thy faithful services!
Forgive me, and entreat Fortune, as well as thou canst, to deliver us
out of this miserable strait we are both in; and I promise to put a
crown of laurel on thy head, and make thee look like a poet laureate,
and give thee double feeds.”

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In this strain did Sancho bewail himself, and his ass listened to him,
but answered him never a word, such was the distress and anguish the
poor beast found himself in. At length, after a night spent in bitter
moanings and lamentations, day came, and by its light Sancho perceived
that it was wholly impossible to escape out of that pit without help,
and he fell to bemoaning his fate and uttering loud shouts to find out
if there was anyone within hearing; but all his shouting was only
crying in the wilderness, for there was not a soul anywhere in the
neighbourhood to hear him, and then at last he gave himself up for
dead. Dapple was lying on his back, and Sancho helped him to his feet,
which he was scarcely able to keep; and then taking a piece of bread
out of his alforjas which had shared their fortunes in the fall, he
gave it to the ass, to whom it was not unwelcome, saying to him as if
he understood him, “With bread all sorrows are less.”

And now he perceived on one side of the pit a hole large enough to
admit a person if he stooped and squeezed himself into a small compass.
Sancho made for it, and entered it by creeping, and found it wide and
spacious on the inside, which he was able to see as a ray of sunlight
that penetrated what might be called the roof showed it all plainly. He
observed too that it opened and widened out into another spacious
cavity; seeing which he made his way back to where the ass was, and
with a stone began to pick away the clay from the hole until in a short
time he had made room for the beast to pass easily, and this
accomplished, taking him by the halter, he proceeded to traverse the
cavern to see if there was any outlet at the other end. He advanced,
sometimes in the dark, sometimes without light, but never without fear;
“God Almighty help me!” said he to himself; “this that is a
misadventure to me would make a good adventure for my master Don
Quixote. He would have been sure to take these depths and dungeons for
flowery gardens or the palaces of Galiana, and would have counted upon
issuing out of this darkness and imprisonment into some blooming
meadow; but I, unlucky that I am, hopeless and spiritless, expect at
every step another pit deeper than the first to open under my feet and
swallow me up for good; ‘welcome evil, if thou comest alone.’”

In this way and with these reflections he seemed to himself to have
travelled rather more than half a league, when at last he perceived a
dim light that looked like daylight and found its way in on one side,
showing that this road, which appeared to him the road to the other
world, led to some opening.

Here Cide Hamete leaves him, and returns to Don Quixote, who in high
spirits and satisfaction was looking forward to the day fixed for the
battle he was to fight with him who had robbed Doña Rodriguez’s
daughter of her honour, for whom he hoped to obtain satisfaction for
the wrong and injury shamefully done to her. It came to pass, then,
that having sallied forth one morning to practise and exercise himself
in what he would have to do in the encounter he expected to find
himself engaged in the next day, as he was putting Rocinante through
his paces or pressing him to the charge, he brought his feet so close
to a pit that but for reining him in tightly it would have been
impossible for him to avoid falling into it. He pulled him up, however,
without a fall, and coming a little closer examined the hole without
dismounting; but as he was looking at it he heard loud cries proceeding
from it, and by listening attentively was able to make out that he who
uttered them was saying, “Ho, above there! is there any Christian that
hears me, or any charitable gentleman that will take pity on a sinner
buried alive, on an unfortunate disgoverned governor?”

It struck Don Quixote that it was the voice of Sancho Panza he heard,
whereat he was taken aback and amazed, and raising his own voice as
much as he could, he cried out, “Who is below there? Who is that
complaining?”

“Who should be here, or who should complain,” was the answer, “but the
forlorn Sancho Panza, for his sins and for his ill-luck governor of the
island of Barataria, squire that was to the famous knight Don Quixote
of La Mancha?”

When Don Quixote heard this his amazement was redoubled and his
perturbation grew greater than ever, for it suggested itself to his
mind that Sancho must be dead, and that his soul was in torment down
there; and carried away by this idea he exclaimed, “I conjure thee by
everything that as a Catholic Christian I can conjure thee by, tell me
who thou art; and if thou art a soul in torment, tell me what thou
wouldst have me do for thee; for as my profession is to give aid and
succour to those that need it in this world, it will also extend to
aiding and succouring the distressed of the other, who cannot help
themselves.”

“In that case,” answered the voice, “your worship who speaks to me must
be my master Don Quixote of La Mancha; nay, from the tone of the voice
it is plain it can be nobody else.”

“Don Quixote I am,” replied Don Quixote, “he whose profession it is to
aid and succour the living and the dead in their necessities; wherefore
tell me who thou art, for thou art keeping me in suspense; because, if
thou art my squire Sancho Panza, and art dead, since the devils have
not carried thee off, and thou art by God’s mercy in purgatory, our
holy mother the Roman Catholic Church has intercessory means sufficient
to release thee from the pains thou art in; and I for my part will
plead with her to that end, so far as my substance will go; without
further delay, therefore, declare thyself, and tell me who thou art.”

“By all that’s good,” was the answer, “and by the birth of whomsoever
your worship chooses, I swear, Señor Don Quixote of La Mancha, that I
am your squire Sancho Panza, and that I have never died all my life;
but that, having given up my government for reasons that would require
more time to explain, I fell last night into this pit where I am now,
and Dapple is witness and won’t let me lie, for more by token he is
here with me.”

Nor was this all; one would have fancied the ass understood what Sancho
said, because that moment he began to bray so loudly that the whole
cave rang again.

“Famous testimony!” exclaimed Don Quixote; “I know that bray as well as
if I was its mother, and thy voice too, my Sancho. Wait while I go to
the duke’s castle, which is close by, and I will bring someone to take
thee out of this pit into which thy sins no doubt have brought thee.”

“Go, your worship,” said Sancho, “and come back quick for God’s sake;
for I cannot bear being buried alive any longer, and I’m dying of
fear.”

Don Quixote left him, and hastened to the castle to tell the duke and
duchess what had happened Sancho, and they were not a little astonished
at it; they could easily understand his having fallen, from the
confirmatory circumstance of the cave which had been in existence there
from time immemorial; but they could not imagine how he had quitted the
government without their receiving any intimation of his coming. To be
brief, they fetched ropes and tackle, as the saying is, and by dint of
many hands and much labour they drew up Dapple and Sancho Panza out of
the darkness into the light of day. A student who saw him remarked,
“That’s the way all bad governors should come out of their governments,
as this sinner comes out of the depths of the pit, dead with hunger,
pale, and I suppose without a farthing.”

Sancho overheard him and said, “It is eight or ten days, brother
growler, since I entered upon the government of the island they gave
me, and all that time I never had a bellyful of victuals, no not for an
hour; doctors persecuted me and enemies crushed my bones; nor had I any
opportunity of taking bribes or levying taxes; and if that be the case,
as it is, I don’t deserve, I think, to come out in this fashion; but
‘man proposes and God disposes;’ and God knows what is best, and what
suits each one best; and ‘as the occasion, so the behaviour;’ and ‘let
nobody say “I won’t drink of this water;”’ and ‘where one thinks there
are flitches, there are no pegs;’ God knows my meaning and that’s
enough; I say no more, though I could.”

“Be not angry or annoyed at what thou hearest, Sancho,” said Don
Quixote, “or there will never be an end of it; keep a safe conscience
and let them say what they like; for trying to stop slanderers’ tongues
is like trying to put gates to the open plain. If a governor comes out
of his government rich, they say he has been a thief; and if he comes
out poor, that he has been a noodle and a blockhead.”

“They’ll be pretty sure this time,” said Sancho, “to set me down for a
fool rather than a thief.”

Thus talking, and surrounded by boys and a crowd of people, they
reached the castle, where in one of the corridors the duke and duchess
stood waiting for them; but Sancho would not go up to see the duke
until he had first put up Dapple in the stable, for he said he had
passed a very bad night in his last quarters; then he went upstairs to
see his lord and lady, and kneeling before them he said, “Because it
was your highnesses’ pleasure, not because of any desert of my own, I
went to govern your island of Barataria, which ‘I entered naked, and
naked I find myself; I neither lose nor gain.’ Whether I have governed
well or ill, I have had witnesses who will say what they think fit. I
have answered questions, I have decided causes, and always dying of
hunger, for Doctor Pedro Recio of Tirteafuera, the island and governor
doctor, would have it so. Enemies attacked us by night and put us in a
great quandary, but the people of the island say they came off safe and
victorious by the might of my arm; and may God give them as much health
as there’s truth in what they say. In short, during that time I have
weighed the cares and responsibilities governing brings with it, and by
my reckoning I find my shoulders can’t bear them, nor are they a load
for my loins or arrows for my quiver; and so, before the government
threw me over I preferred to throw the government over; and yesterday
morning I left the island as I found it, with the same streets, houses,
and roofs it had when I entered it. I asked no loan of anybody, nor did
I try to fill my pocket; and though I meant to make some useful laws, I
made hardly any, as I was afraid they would not be kept; for in that
case it comes to the same thing to make them or not to make them. I
quitted the island, as I said, without any escort except my ass; I fell
into a pit, I pushed on through it, until this morning by the light of
the sun I saw an outlet, but not so easy a one but that, had not heaven
sent me my master Don Quixote, I’d have stayed there till the end of
the world. So now my lord and lady duke and duchess, here is your
governor Sancho Panza, who in the bare ten days he has held the
government has come by the knowledge that he would not give anything to
be governor, not to say of an island, but of the whole world; and that
point being settled, kissing your worships’ feet, and imitating the
game of the boys when they say, ‘leap thou, and give me one,’ I take a
leap out of the government and pass into the service of my master Don
Quixote; for after all, though in it I eat my bread in fear and
trembling, at any rate I take my fill; and for my part, so long as I’m
full, it’s all alike to me whether it’s with carrots or with
partridges.”

Here Sancho brought his long speech to an end, Don Quixote having been
the whole time in dread of his uttering a host of absurdities; and when
he found him leave off with so few, he thanked heaven in his heart. The
duke embraced Sancho and told him he was heartily sorry he had given up
the government so soon, but that he would see that he was provided with
some other post on his estate less onerous and more profitable. The
duchess also embraced him, and gave orders that he should be taken good
care of, as it was plain to see he had been badly treated and worse
bruised.

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CHAPTER LVI.
OF THE PRODIGIOUS AND UNPARALLELED BATTLE THAT TOOK PLACE BETWEEN DON
QUIXOTE OF LA MANCHA AND THE LACQUEY TOSILOS IN DEFENCE OF THE DAUGHTER
OF DOÑA RODRIGUEZ

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The duke and duchess had no reason to regret the joke that had been
played upon Sancho Panza in giving him the government; especially as
their majordomo returned the same day, and gave them a minute account
of almost every word and deed that Sancho uttered or did during the
time; and to wind up with, eloquently described to them the attack upon
the island and Sancho’s fright and departure, with which they were not
a little amused. After this the history goes on to say that the day
fixed for the battle arrived, and that the duke, after having
repeatedly instructed his lacquey Tosilos how to deal with Don Quixote
so as to vanquish him without killing or wounding him, gave orders to
have the heads removed from the lances, telling Don Quixote that
Christian charity, on which he plumed himself, could not suffer the
battle to be fought with so much risk and danger to life; and that he
must be content with the offer of a battlefield on his territory
(though that was against the decree of the holy Council, which
prohibits all challenges of the sort) and not push such an arduous
venture to its extreme limits. Don Quixote bade his excellence arrange
all matters connected with the affair as he pleased, as on his part he
would obey him in everything. The dread day, then, having arrived, and
the duke having ordered a spacious stand to be erected facing the court
of the castle for the judges of the field and the appellant duennas,
mother and daughter, vast crowds flocked from all the villages and
hamlets of the neighbourhood to see the novel spectacle of the battle;
nobody, dead or alive, in those parts having ever seen or heard of such
a one.

The first person to enter the field and the lists was the master of the
ceremonies, who surveyed and paced the whole ground to see that there
was nothing unfair and nothing concealed to make the combatants stumble
or fall; then the duennas entered and seated themselves, enveloped in
mantles covering their eyes, nay even their bosoms, and displaying no
slight emotion as Don Quixote appeared in the lists. Shortly
afterwards, accompanied by several trumpets and mounted on a powerful
steed that threatened to crush the whole place, the great lacquey
Tosilos made his appearance on one side of the courtyard with his visor
down and stiffly cased in a suit of stout shining armour. The horse was
a manifest Frieslander, broad-backed and flea-bitten, and with half a
hundred of wool hanging to each of his fetlocks. The gallant combatant
came well primed by his master the duke as to how he was to bear
himself against the valiant Don Quixote of La Mancha; being warned that
he must on no account slay him, but strive to shirk the first encounter
so as to avoid the risk of killing him, as he was sure to do if he met
him full tilt. He crossed the courtyard at a walk, and coming to where
the duennas were placed stopped to look at her who demanded him for a
husband; the marshal of the field summoned Don Quixote, who had already
presented himself in the courtyard, and standing by the side of Tosilos
he addressed the duennas, and asked them if they consented that Don
Quixote of La Mancha should do battle for their right. They said they
did, and that whatever he should do in that behalf they declared
rightly done, final and valid. By this time the duke and duchess had
taken their places in a gallery commanding the enclosure, which was
filled to overflowing with a multitude of people eager to see this
perilous and unparalleled encounter. The conditions of the combat were
that if Don Quixote proved the victor his antagonist was to marry the
daughter of Doña Rodriguez; but if he should be vanquished his opponent
was released from the promise that was claimed against him and from all
obligations to give satisfaction. The master of the ceremonies
apportioned the sun to them, and stationed them, each on the spot where
he was to stand. The drums beat, the sound of the trumpets filled the
air, the earth trembled under foot, the hearts of the gazing crowd were
full of anxiety, some hoping for a happy issue, some apprehensive of an
untoward ending to the affair, and lastly, Don Quixote, commending
himself with all his heart to God our Lord and to the lady Dulcinea del
Toboso, stood waiting for them to give the necessary signal for the
onset. Our lacquey, however, was thinking of something very different;
he only thought of what I am now going to mention.

It seems that as he stood contemplating his enemy she struck him as the
most beautiful woman he had ever seen all his life; and the little
blind boy whom in our streets they commonly call Love had no mind to
let slip the chance of triumphing over a lacquey heart, and adding it
to the list of his trophies; and so, stealing gently upon him unseen,
he drove a dart two yards long into the poor lacquey’s left side and
pierced his heart through and through; which he was able to do quite at
his ease, for Love is invisible, and comes in and goes out as he likes,
without anyone calling him to account for what he does. Well then, when
they gave the signal for the onset our lacquey was in an ecstasy,
musing upon the beauty of her whom he had already made mistress of his
liberty, and so he paid no attention to the sound of the trumpet,
unlike Don Quixote, who was off the instant he heard it, and, at the
highest speed Rocinante was capable of, set out to meet his enemy, his
good squire Sancho shouting lustily as he saw him start, “God guide
thee, cream and flower of knights-errant! God give thee the victory,
for thou hast the right on thy side!” But though Tosilos saw Don
Quixote coming at him he never stirred a step from the spot where he
was posted; and instead of doing so called loudly to the marshal of the
field, to whom when he came up to see what he wanted he said, “Señor,
is not this battle to decide whether I marry or do not marry that
lady?” “Just so,” was the answer. “Well then,” said the lacquey, “I
feel qualms of conscience, and I should lay a heavy burden upon it if I
were to proceed any further with the combat; I therefore declare that I
yield myself vanquished, and that I am willing to marry the lady at
once.”

The marshal of the field was lost in astonishment at the words of
Tosilos; and as he was one of those who were privy to the arrangement
of the affair he knew not what to say in reply. Don Quixote pulled up
in mid career when he saw that his enemy was not coming on to the
attack. The duke could not make out the reason why the battle did not
go on; but the marshal of the field hastened to him to let him know
what Tosilos said, and he was amazed and extremely angry at it. In the
meantime Tosilos advanced to where Doña Rodriguez sat and said in a
loud voice, “Señora, I am willing to marry your daughter, and I have no
wish to obtain by strife and fighting what I can obtain in peace and
without any risk to my life.”

The valiant Don Quixote heard him, and said, “As that is the case I am
released and absolved from my promise; let them marry by all means, and
as ‘God our Lord has given her, may Saint Peter add his blessing.’”

The duke had now descended to the courtyard of the castle, and going up
to Tosilos he said to him, “Is it true, sir knight, that you yield
yourself vanquished, and that moved by scruples of conscience you wish
to marry this damsel?”

“It is, señor,” replied Tosilos.

“And he does well,” said Sancho, “for what thou hast to give to the
mouse, give to the cat, and it will save thee all trouble.”

Tosilos meanwhile was trying to unlace his helmet, and he begged them
to come to his help at once, as his power of breathing was failing him,
and he could not remain so long shut up in that confined space. They
removed it in all haste, and his lacquey features were revealed to
public gaze. At this sight Doña Rodriguez and her daughter raised a
mighty outcry, exclaiming, “This is a trick! This is a trick! They have
put Tosilos, my lord the duke’s lacquey, upon us in place of the real
husband. The justice of God and the king against such trickery, not to
say roguery!”

“Do not distress yourselves, ladies,” said Don Quixote; “for this is no
trickery or roguery; or if it is, it is not the duke who is at the
bottom of it, but those wicked enchanters who persecute me, and who,
jealous of my reaping the glory of this victory, have turned your
husband’s features into those of this person, who you say is a lacquey
of the duke’s; take my advice, and notwithstanding the malice of my
enemies marry him, for beyond a doubt he is the one you wish for a
husband.”

When the duke heard this all his anger was near vanishing in a fit of
laughter, and he said, “The things that happen to Señor Don Quixote are
so extraordinary that I am ready to believe this lacquey of mine is not
one; but let us adopt this plan and device; let us put off the marriage
for, say, a fortnight, and let us keep this person about whom we are
uncertain in close confinement, and perhaps in the course of that time
he may return to his original shape; for the spite which the enchanters
entertain against Señor Don Quixote cannot last so long, especially as
it is of so little advantage to them to practise these deceptions and
transformations.”

“Oh, señor,” said Sancho, “those scoundrels are well used to changing
whatever concerns my master from one thing into another. A knight that
he overcame some time back, called the Knight of the Mirrors, they
turned into the shape of the bachelor Samson Carrasco of our town and a
great friend of ours; and my lady Dulcinea del Toboso they have turned
into a common country wench; so I suspect this lacquey will have to
live and die a lacquey all the days of his life.”

Here the Rodriguez’s daughter exclaimed, “Let him be who he may, this
man that claims me for a wife; I am thankful to him for the same, for I
had rather be the lawful wife of a lacquey than the cheated mistress of
a gentleman; though he who played me false is nothing of the kind.”

To be brief, all the talk and all that had happened ended in Tosilos
being shut up until it was seen how his transformation turned out. All
hailed Don Quixote as victor, but the greater number were vexed and
disappointed at finding that the combatants they had been so anxiously
waiting for had not battered one another to pieces, just as the boys
are disappointed when the man they are waiting to see hanged does not
come out, because the prosecution or the court has pardoned him. The
people dispersed, the duke and Don Quixote returned to the castle, they
locked up Tosilos, Doña Rodriguez and her daughter remained perfectly
contented when they saw that any way the affair must end in marriage,
and Tosilos wanted nothing else.

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CHAPTER LVII.
WHICH TREATS OF HOW DON QUIXOTE TOOK LEAVE OF THE DUKE, AND OF WHAT
FOLLOWED WITH THE WITTY AND IMPUDENT ALTISIDORA, ONE OF THE DUCHESS’S
DAMSELS

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Don Quixote now felt it right to quit a life of such idleness as he was
leading in the castle; for he fancied that he was making himself sorely
missed by suffering himself to remain shut up and inactive amid the
countless luxuries and enjoyments his hosts lavished upon him as a
knight, and he felt too that he would have to render a strict account
to heaven of that indolence and seclusion; and so one day he asked the
duke and duchess to grant him permission to take his departure. They
gave it, showing at the same time that they were very sorry he was
leaving them.

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The duchess gave his wife’s letters to Sancho Panza, who shed tears
over them, saying, “Who would have thought that such grand hopes as the
news of my government bred in my wife Teresa Panza’s breast would end
in my going back now to the vagabond adventures of my master Don
Quixote of La Mancha? Still I’m glad to see my Teresa behaved as she
ought in sending the acorns, for if she had not sent them I’d have been
sorry, and she’d have shown herself ungrateful. It is a comfort to me
that they can’t call that present a bribe; for I had got the government
already when she sent them, and it’s but reasonable that those who have
had a good turn done them should show their gratitude, if it’s only
with a trifle. After all I went into the government naked, and I come
out of it naked; so I can say with a safe conscience—and that’s no
small matter—‘naked I was born, naked I find myself, I neither lose nor
gain.’”

Thus did Sancho soliloquise on the day of their departure, as Don
Quixote, who had the night before taken leave of the duke and duchess,
coming out made his appearance at an early hour in full armour in the
courtyard of the castle. The whole household of the castle were
watching him from the corridors, and the duke and duchess, too, came
out to see him. Sancho was mounted on his Dapple, with his alforjas,
valise, and proven supremely happy because the duke’s majordomo, the
same that had acted the part of the Trifaldi, had given him a little
purse with two hundred gold crowns to meet the necessary expenses of
the road, but of this Don Quixote knew nothing as yet. While all were,
as has been said, observing him, suddenly from among the duennas and
handmaidens the impudent and witty Altisidora lifted up her voice and
said in pathetic tones:

Give ear, cruel knight;
Draw rein; where’s the need
Of spurring the flanks
Of that ill-broken steed?
From what art thou flying?
No dragon I am,
Not even a sheep,
But a tender young lamb.
Thou hast jilted a maiden
As fair to behold
As nymph of Diana
Or Venus of old.
Bireno, Æneas, what worse shall I call thee?
Barabbas go with thee! All evil befall thee!

In thy claws, ruthless robber,
Thou bearest away
The heart of a meek
Loving maid for thy prey,
Three kerchiefs thou stealest,
And garters a pair,
From legs than the whitest
Of marble more fair;
And the sighs that pursue thee
Would burn to the ground
Two thousand Troy Towns,
If so many were found.
Bireno, Æneas, what worse shall I call thee?
Barabbas go with thee! All evil befall thee!

May no bowels of mercy
To Sancho be granted,
And thy Dulcinea
Be left still enchanted,
May thy falsehood to me
Find its punishment in her,
For in my land the just
Often pays for the sinner.
May thy grandest adventures
Discomfitures prove,
May thy joys be all dreams,
And forgotten thy love.
Bireno, Æneas, what worse shall I call thee?
Barabbas go with thee! All evil befall thee!

May thy name be abhorred
For thy conduct to ladies,
From London to England,
From Seville to Cadiz;
May thy cards be unlucky,
Thy hands contain ne’er a
King, seven, or ace
When thou playest primera;
When thy corns are cut
May it be to the quick;
When thy grinders are drawn
May the roots of them stick.
Bireno, Æneas, what worse shall I call thee?
Barabbas go with thee! All evil befall thee!

All the while the unhappy Altisidora was bewailing herself in the above
strain Don Quixote stood staring at her; and without uttering a word in
reply to her he turned round to Sancho and said, “Sancho my friend, I
conjure thee by the life of thy forefathers tell me the truth; say,
hast thou by any chance taken the three kerchiefs and the garters this
love-sick maid speaks of?”

To this Sancho made answer, “The three kerchiefs I have; but the
garters, as much as ‘over the hills of Úbeda.’”

The duchess was amazed at Altisidora’s assurance; she knew that she was
bold, lively, and impudent, but not so much so as to venture to make
free in this fashion; and not being prepared for the joke, her
astonishment was all the greater. The duke had a mind to keep up the
sport, so he said, “It does not seem to me well done in you, sir
knight, that after having received the hospitality that has been
offered you in this very castle, you should have ventured to carry off
even three kerchiefs, not to say my handmaid’s garters. It shows a bad
heart and does not tally with your reputation. Restore her garters, or
else I defy you to mortal combat, for I am not afraid of rascally
enchanters changing or altering my features as they changed his who
encountered you into those of my lacquey, Tosilos.”

“God forbid,” said Don Quixote, “that I should draw my sword against
your illustrious person from which I have received such great favours.
The kerchiefs I will restore, as Sancho says he has them; as to the
garters that is impossible, for I have not got them, neither has he;
and if your handmaiden here will look in her hiding-places, depend upon
it she will find them. I have never been a thief, my lord duke, nor do
I mean to be so long as I live, if God cease not to have me in his
keeping. This damsel by her own confession speaks as one in love, for
which I am not to blame, and therefore need not ask pardon, either of
her or of your excellence, whom I entreat to have a better opinion of
me, and once more to give me leave to pursue my journey.”

“And may God so prosper it, Señor Don Quixote,” said the duchess, “that
we may always hear good news of your exploits; God speed you; for the
longer you stay, the more you inflame the hearts of the damsels who
behold you; and as for this one of mine, I will so chastise her that
she will not transgress again, either with her eyes or with her words.”

“One word and no more, O valiant Don Quixote, I ask you to hear,” said
Altisidora, “and that is that I beg your pardon about the theft of the
garters; for by God and upon my soul I have got them on, and I have
fallen into the same blunder as he did who went looking for his ass
being all the while mounted on it.”

“Didn’t I say so?” said Sancho. “I’m a likely one to hide thefts! Why
if I wanted to deal in them, opportunities came ready enough to me in
my government.”

Don Quixote bowed his head, and saluted the duke and duchess and all
the bystanders, and wheeling Rocinante round, Sancho following him on
Dapple, he rode out of the castle, shaping his course for Saragossa.

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