_Wherein is related the stratagem practised by Sancho, of enchanting
the Lady Dulcinea; with other events no less ludicrous than true._
The knight's frenzy appears now to be carried to an excess beyond all
conception. Having retired into a grove near the city of Toboso, he
despatched Sancho with orders not to return into his presence till he
had spoken to his lady, beseeching her that she would be pleased to
grant her captive knight permission to wait upon her, and that she
would deign to bestow on him her benediction, whereby he might secure
complete success in all his encounters and arduous enterprises. Sancho
promised to return with an answer no less favourable than that which
he had formerly brought him. "Go then, son," replied Don Quixote, "and
be not in confusion when thou standest in the blaze of that sun of
beauty. Happy thou above all the squires in the world! Deeply impress
on thy memory the particulars of thy reception--whether she changes
colour while thou art delivering thy embassy, and betrays agitation on
hearing my name; whether her cushion cannot hold her, if perchance
thou shouldst find her seated on the rich Estrado; or, if standing,
mark whether she is not obliged to sustain herself sometimes upon one
foot and sometimes upon the other; whether she repeats her answer to
thee three or four times: in short, observe all her actions and
motions; for by an accurate detail of them I shall be enabled to
penetrate into the secret recesses of her heart touching the affair of
my love; for let me tell thee, Sancho, that with lovers the external
actions and gestures are couriers, which bear authentic tidings of
what is passing in the interior of the soul. Go, friend, and be thou
more successful than my anxious heart will bode during the painful
period of thy absence." "I will go, and return quickly," quoth Sancho.
"In the mean time, good sir, cheer up, and remember the saying, that
'A good heart breaks bad luck;' and 'If there is no hook, there is no
bacon;' and 'Where we least expect it, the hare starts:' this I say,
because, though we could not find the castle or palace of my Lady
Dulcinea in the dark, now that it is daylight I reckon I shall soon
find it, and then--let me alone to deal with her." "Verily, Sancho,"
quoth Don Quixote, "thou dost apply thy proverbs most happily; yet
Heaven grant me better luck in the attainment of my hopes!"
Sancho now switched his Dapple and set off, leaving Don Quixote on
horseback, resting on his stirrups and leaning on his lance, full of
melancholy and confused fancies, where we will leave him and attend
Sancho Panza, who departed no less perplexed and thoughtful; insomuch
that, after he had got out of the grove, and looked behind him to
ascertain that his master was out of sight, he alighted, and, sitting
down at the foot of a tree, he began to hold a parley with himself.
"Tell me now, brother Sancho," quoth he, "whither is your worship
going? Are you going to seek some ass that is lost?" "No verily."
"Then what are you going to seek?" "Why I go to look for a thing of
nothing--a princess, the sun of beauty, and all heaven together!"
"Well, Sancho, and where think you to find all this?" "Where? In the
great city of Toboso." "Very well; and pray who sent you on this
errand?" "Why the renowned knight Don Quixote de la Mancha, who
redresses wrongs, and gives drink to the hungry and meat to the
thirsty." "All this is mighty well; and do you know her house,
Sancho?" "My master says it must be some royal palace or stately
castle." "And have you ever seen her?" "Neither I nor my master have
ever seen her!--Well," continued he, "there is a remedy for every
thing but death, who, in spite of our teeth, will have us in his
clutches. This master of mine, I can plainly see, is mad enough for a
strait waistcoat; and, in truth, I am not much better; nay, I am
worse, in following and serving him, if there is any truth in the
proverb, 'Shew me who thou art with, and I will tell thee what thou
art;' or in the other, 'Not with whom thou wert bred, but with whom
thou art fed.' He then being in truth a madman, and so mad as
frequently to mistake one thing for another, and not know black from
white; as plainly appeared when he called the windmills giants, mules
dromedaries, and the flock of sheep armies of fighting men, with many
more things to the same tune; this being the case, I say, it will not
be very difficult to make him believe that a country girl (the first I
light upon) is the Lady Dulcinea; and, should he not believe it, I
will swear to it; and if he swears, I will outswear him; and if he
persists, I will persist the more; so that mine shall still be
uppermost, come what will of it. By this plan I may perhaps tire him
of sending me on such errands; or he may take it into his head that
some wicked enchanter has changed his lady's form, out of pure spite."
This project set Sancho's spirit at rest, and he reckoned his business
as good as half done; so he stayed where he was till towards evening,
that Don Quixote might suppose him travelling on his mission.
Fortunately for him, just as he was going to mount his Dapple, he
espied three country girls coming from Toboso, each mounted on a young
ass. Sancho no sooner got sight of them than he rode back at a good
pace to seek his master Don Quixote, whom he found breathing a
thousand sighs and amorous lamentations. When Don Quixote saw him, he
said, "Well, friend Sancho, am I to mark this day with a white or a
black stone?" "Your worship," answered Sancho, "had better mark it
with red ochre!" "Thou bringest me good news, then?" cried Don
Quixote. "So good," answered Sancho, "that your worship has only to
clap spurs to Rozinante, and get out upon the plain to see the lady
Dulcinea del Toboso, who, with a couple of her damsels, is coming to
pay your worship a visit." "Gracious Heaven!" exclaimed Don Quixote,
"what dost thou say? Take care that thou beguilest not my real sorrow
by a counterfeit joy." "What should I get," answered Sancho, "by
deceiving your worship, only to be found out the next moment? Come,
sir, put on, and you will see the princess, our mistress, all arrayed
and adorned--in short, like herself. She and her damsels are one blaze
of flaming gold; all strings of pearls, all diamonds, all rubies, all
cloth of tissue above ten hands deep; their hair loose about their
shoulders, like so many sunbeams blowing about in the wind; and, what
is more, they come mounted upon three pyed belfreys, the finest you
ever laid eyes on." "Palfreys, thou wouldst say, Sancho," quoth Don
Quixote. "Well, well," answered Sancho, "belfreys and palfreys are
much the same thing; but let them be mounted how they will, they are
sure the finest creatures one would wish to see, especially my
mistress the princess Dulcinea, who dazzles one's senses." "Let us go,
son Sancho," answered Don Quixote; "and, as a reward for this welcome
news, I bequeath to thee the choicest spoils I shall gain in my next
adventure."
They were now got out of the wood, and saw the three girls very near.
Don Quixote looked eagerly along the road towards Toboso, and, seeing
nobody but the three girls, he asked Sancho, in much agitation,
whether they were out of the city when he left them. "Out of the
city!" answered Sancho; "are your worship's eyes in the nape of your
neck, that you do not see them now before you, shining like the sun at
noon-day?" "I see only three country girls," answered Don Quixote, "on
three asses." "Now, keep me from mischief!" answered Sancho; "is it
possible that three belfreys, or how do you call them, white as the
driven snow, should look to you like asses? As I am alive, you shall
pluck off this beard of mine if it be so." "I tell thee, friend
Sancho," answered Don Quixote, "that it is as certain they are asses
as that I am Don Quixote and thou Sancho Panza; at least so they seem
to me." "Sir," quoth Sancho, "say not such a thing; but snuff those
eyes of yours, and come and pay reverence to the mistress of your
soul." So saying he advanced forward to meet the peasant girls; and,
alighting from Dapple, he laid hold of one of their asses by the
halter, and, bending both knees to the ground, said to the girl,
"Queen, princess, and duchess of beauty, let your haughtiness and
greatness be pleased to receive into your grace and good-liking your
captive knight, who stands there turned into stone, all disorder and
without any pulse, to find himself before your magnificent presence. I
am Sancho Panza, his squire, and he is that wayworn knight Don Quixote
de la Mancha, otherwise called the Knight of the Sorrowful Figure."
Don Quixote had now placed himself on his knees by Sancho, and with
wild and staring eyes surveyed her whom Sancho called his queen; and
seeing nothing but a peasant girl, with a broad face, flat nose,
coarse and homely, he was so confounded that he could not open his
lips. The girls were also surprised to find themselves stopped by two
men so different in aspect, and both on their knees; but the lady who
was stopped, breaking silence, said in an angry tone, "Get out of the
road, plague on ye! and let us pass by, for we are in haste." "O
princess and universal lady of Toboso!" cried Sancho, "is not your
magnificent heart melting to see, on his knees before your sublimated
presence, the pillar and prop of knight-errantry?" "Hey day! what's
here to do?" cried another of the girls; "look how your small gentry
come to jeer us poor country girls, as if we could not give them as
good as they bring; go, get off about your business, and let us mind
ours, and so speed you well." "Rise, Sancho," said Don Quixote, on
hearing this; "for I now perceive that fortune, not yet satisfied with
persecuting me, has barred every avenue whereby relief might come to
this wretched soul I bear about me. And thou, O extreme of all that is
valuable, summit of human perfection, thou sole balm to this
disconsolate heart that adores thee, though now some wicked enchanter
spreads clouds and cataracts over my eyes, changing, and to them only,
thy peerless beauty into that of a poor rustic; if he has not
converted mine also into that of some goblin, to render it horrible to
thy view, bestow on me one kind look, and let this submissive posture,
these bended knees, before thy disguised beauty, declare the humility
with which my soul adores thee!" "Marry come up," quoth the girl,
"with your idle gibberish! get on with you, and let us go, and we
shall take it kindly." Sancho now let go the halter, delighted that he
had come off so well with his contrivance. The imaginary Dulcinea was
no sooner at liberty than, pricking her beast with a sharp-pointed
stick which she held in her hand, she scoured along the field; but the
ass, smarting more than usual under the goad, began to kick and wince
in such a manner that down came the Lady Dulcinea to the ground. Don
Quixote was proceeding to raise his enchanted mistress, but the lady
saved him that trouble; for immediately upon getting up from the
ground she retired three or four steps back, took a little run, then
clapping both hands upon the ass's crupper, jumped into the saddle
lighter than a falcon, and seated herself astride like a man. "By
Saint Roque!" cried Sancho, "our lady mistress is lighter than a bird,
and could teach the nimblest Cordovan or Mexican how to mount: she
springs into the saddle at a jump, and without the help of spurs,
makes her palfrey run like a wild ass; and her damsels are not a whit
short of her, for they all fly like the wind!" And this was the truth;
for Dulcinea being remounted, the other two made after her at full
speed, without looking behind them, for above half a league.
Don Quixote followed them with his eyes as far as he was able; and
when they were out of sight, turning to Sancho, he said, "What dost
thou think now, Sancho? See how I am persecuted by enchanters! Mark
how far their malice extends, even to depriving me of the pleasure of
seeing my mistress in her own proper form! Surely I was born to be an
example of wretchedness, and the butt and mark at which all the arrows
of ill-fortune are aimed! And thou must have observed too, Sancho,
that these traitors were not contented with changing and transforming
the countenance of my Dulcinea, but they must give her the base and
uncouth figure of a country wench. But tell me, Sancho, that which to
me appeared to be a pannel, was it a side-saddle or a pillion?" "It
was a side-saddle," answered Sancho, "with a field covering, worth
half a kingdom for the richness of it." "And that I should not see all
this!" exclaimed Don Quixote. "Again I say, and a thousand times will
I repeat it, I am the most unfortunate of men!" The sly rogue Sancho
had much difficulty to forbear laughing to think how finely his master
was gulled. After more dialogue of the same kind, they mounted their
beasts again, and followed the road to Saragossa, still intending to
be present at a solemn festival annually held in that city. But before
they reached it, events befell them which, for their importance,
variety, and novelty, well deserve to be recorded and read.