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The Life and Achievements of Don Quixote De La Mancha is a Spanish epic novel by Miguel de Cervantes. Originally published in two parts, in 1605 and 1615, its full title is The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha. A founding work of Western literature, it is often labelled as the first modern novel and one of the greatest works ever written. Don Quixote is also one of the most-translated books in the world.

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CHAPTER XXXIX.
What passed between Don Quixote, his Niece, and the Housekeeper; being one of the most important chapters in the whole history.

While Sancho Panza and his wife Teresa Cascajo had the foregoing dialogue, Don Quixote's niece and housekeeper were not idle, guessing by a thousand signs that the knight intended a third sally. Therefore they endeavoured by all possible means to divert him from his design; but all in vain; for it was but preaching to a rock, and hammering stubborn steel. "In short, sir," quoth the housekeeper, "if you will not be ruled, but will needs run wandering over hill and dale, seeking for mischief--for so I may well call the hopeful adventures which you go about--I will never leave complaining to Heaven and the king, till there is a stop put to it some way or other."

"What answer Heaven will vouchsafe to give thee, I know not," answered Don Quixote; "neither can I tell what return his majesty will make to thy petition. This I know, that were I king, I would excuse myself from answering the infinite number of impertinent memorials that disturb the repose of princes. I tell thee, woman, among the many other fatigues which royalty sustains, it is one of the greatest to be obliged to hear every one, and to give answer to all people. Therefore, pray trouble not his majesty with anything concerning me." "But pray, sir, tell me," replied she, "are there not amany knights in the king's court?" "I must confess," said Don Quixote, "that, for the ornament, the grandeur, and the pomp of royalty, many knights are and ought to be maintained there." "Why, then," said the woman, "would it not be better for your worship to be one of those brave knights who serve the king their master on foot in his court?" "Hear me, sweetheart," answered Don Quixote; "all knights cannot be courtiers, nor can all courtiers be knights-errant. There must be of all sorts in the world; and though we were all to agree in the common appellation of knights, yet there would be a great difference between the one and the other. For your courtiers, without so much as stirring out of the shade and shelter of the court, can journey over all the universe in a map, without the expense and fatigue of travelling, without suffering the inconveniencies of heat, cold, hunger, and thirst; while we who are the true knights-errant, exposed to all the inclemencies of heaven, by night and day, on foot as well as on horseback, measure the whole surface of the earth with our own feet. And further, the true knight-errant, though he met ten giants, whose tall aspiring heads not only touch but overtop the clouds, each of them stalking with prodigious legs like huge towers, their sweeping arms like masts of mighty ships, each eye as large as a mill-wheel, and more fiery than a glass furnace; yet he is so far from being afraid to meet them, that he must encounter them with a gentle countenance and an undaunted courage,-assail them, close with them, and if possible vanquish and destroy them all in an instant." "Ah, dear uncle," said the niece, "have a care what you say; all the stories of knights-errant are nothing but a pack of lies and fables, and deserve to be burnt, that the world may know them to be wicked, and perverters of good manners." "Wert thou not my own sister's daughter," cried the Don, "I would take such revenge for the blasphemy thou hast uttered, as would resound through the whole universe. Who ever heard of the like impudence? That a young baggage, who scarce knows her bobbins from a bodkin, should presume to put in her oar, and censure the histories of the knights-errant! What would Sir Amadis have said, had he heard this? He undoubtedly would have forgiven thee, for he was the most courteous and complaisant knight of his time, especially to the fair sex, being a great protector of damsels; but thy words might have reached the ears of some that would have sacrificed thee to their indignation; for all knights are not equally possessed of civility or good-nature; neither are all those that assume the name of a disposition suitable to the function. Some indeed are of the right stamp, but others are either counterfeit, or of such an allay as cannot bear the touchstone, though they deceive the sight. Inferior mortals there are who aim at knighthood, and strain to reach the height of honour; and high-born knights there are, who seem fond of grovelling in the dust, and being lost in the crowd of inferior mortals: the first raise themselves by ambition or by virtue; the last debase themselves by negligence or by vice: so that there is need of a distinguishing understanding to judge between these two sorts of knights, so nearly allied in name, and so different in actions.""Bless me, dear uncle," cried the niece, "that you should know so much as to be able, if there was occasion, to get up into a pulpit, or preach in the streets, and yet be so strangely mistaken as to fancy a man of your years can be strong and valiant,-that you can set every thing right, and force stubborn malice to bend, when you yourself stoop beneath the burden of age; and what is yet more odd, that you are a knight, when it is well known you are none! For though some gentlemen may be knights, a poor gentleman can hardly be so, because he cannot buy it."

"You say well, niece," answered Don Quixote; "and as to this last observation, I could tell you things that you would admire at, concerning families; but because I would not mix sacred things with profane, I wave the discourse. However, listen both of you; and for your farther instruction know, that all the lineages and descents of mankind are reducible to these four heads: first, of those who, from a very small and obscure beginning, have raised themselves to a spreading and prodigious magnitude; secondly, of those who, deriving their greatness from a noble spring, still preserve the dignity and character of their original splendour; a third are those who, though they had large foundations, have ended in a point, like a pyramid, which by little and little dwindles as it were into nothing, or next to nothing, in comparison of its basis. Others there are (and those are the bulk of mankind) who have neither a good beginning, nor rational continuance, and whose ending shall therefore be obscure: such are the common people--the plebeian race. The Ottoman family is an instance of the first sort, having derived their present greatness from the poor beginning of a base-born shepherd. Of the second sort-"
But here somebody knocked at the door; and being asked who it was, Sancho answered it was he. Whereupon the housekeeper slipped out of the way, not willing to see him, and the niece let him in. Don Quixote received him with open arms; and locking themselves both in the closet, they had another dialogue as pleasant as the former, the result of which was, that they resolved at once to proceed in their enterprise.
With the approbation of Sigñor Carrasco, who was now the knight's oracle, it was decreed that they should set out at the expiration of three days; in which time all necessaries should be provided, especially a whole helmet, which Don Quixote said he was resolved by all means to purchase. Samson offered him one which he knew he could easily get of a friend, and which looked more dull with the mould and rust, than bright with the lustre of the steel. The niece and the housekeeper made a woful outcry, tore their hair, scratched their faces, and howled like common mourners at funerals, lamenting the knight's departure as it had been his real death, and abusing Carrasco most unmercifully. In short, Don Quixote and his squire having got all things in readiness--the one having pacified his wife, and the other his niece and housekeeper--towards the evening, without being seen by anybody but the bachelor, who would needs accompany them about half a league from the village, they set forward for Toboso. The knight mounted his Rozinante, and Sancho his trusty Dapple, his wallet well stuffed with provisions, and his purse with money, which Don Quixote gave him to defray expenses. At last Samson took his leave, desiring the champion to give him, from time to time, an account of his success, that, according to the laws of friendship, he might sympathise in his good or evil fortune. Don Quixote made him a promise, and then they parted; Samson went home, and the knight and squire continued their journey for the great city of Toboso.

CHAPTER XL.
Don Quixote's success in his journey to visit the Lady Dulcinea del Toboso.

Don Quixote and his squire were no sooner parted from the bachelor, but Rozinante began to neigh, and Dapple to bray; which both the knight and the squire interpreted as good omens, and most fortunate presages of their success; though the truth of the story is, that as Dapple's braying exceeded Rozinante's neighing, Sancho concluded that his fortune should out-rival and eclipse his master's; which inference I will not say he drew from some principles in judicial astrology, in which he was undoubtedly well grounded, though the history is silent in that particular; however, it is recorded of him that oftentimes upon the falling or stumbling of his ass, he wished he had not gone abroad that day, and from such accidents prognosticated nothing but dislocation of joints and breaking of ribs; and notwithstanding his foolish character, this was no bad observation. "Friend Sancho," said Don Quixote to him, "I find the approaching night will overtake us ere we can reach Toboso, where, before I enter upon any expedition, I am resolved to pay my vows, receive my benediction, and take my leave of the peerless Dulcinea; being assured after that of a happy issue in the most dangerous adventures; for nothing in this world inspires a knight-errant with so much valour as the smiles and favourable aspect of his mistress." "I am of your mind," quoth Sancho; "but I am afraid, sir, you will hardly come at her to speak with her, at least not to meet her in a place where she may give you her blessing, unless she throw it over the mud-wall of the yard, where I first saw her when I carried her the news of your pranks in the midst of Sierra Morena." "Mud-wall, dost thou say?" cried Don Quixote: "mistaken fool, that wall could have no existence but in thy muddy understanding; it is a mere creature of thy dirty fancy; for that never-duly-celebrated paragon of beauty and gentility was then undoubtedly in some court, in some stately gallery or walk; or, as it is properly called, in some sumptuous and royal palace." "It may be so," said Sancho, "though, so far as I can remember, it seemed to me neither better nor worse than a mud-wall." "It is no matter," replied the knight, "let us go thither; I will visit my dear Dulcinea; let me but see her, though it be over a mud-wall, through a chink of a cottage, or the pales of a garden, at a lattice, or anywhere; which way soever the least beam from her bright eyes reaches mine, it will so enlighten my mind, so fortify my heart, and invigorate every faculty of my being, that no mortal will be able to rival me in prudence and valour." "Troth! sir," quoth Sancho, "when I beheld that same sun of a lady, methought it did not shine so bright as to cast forth any beams at all; but mayhaps the reason was, that the dust of the grain she was winnowing raised a cloud about her face, and made her look somewhat dull." "I tell thee again, fool," said Don Quixote, "thy imagination is dusty and foul; will it never be beaten out of thy stupid brain, that my lady Dulcinea was winnowing? Are such exercises used by persons of her quality, whose recreations are always noble, and such as display an air of greatness suitable to their birth and dignity? Can'st thou not remember the verses of our poet, when he recounts the employments of the four nymphs at their crystal mansions, when they advanced their heads above the streams of the lovely Tagus, and sat upon the grass working those rich embroideries, where silk and gold, and pearl embossed, were so curiously interwoven, and which that ingenious bard so artfully describes? So was my princess employed when she blessed thee with her sight; but the envious malice of some base necromancer fascinated thy sight, as it represents whatever is most grateful to me in different and displeasing shapes. And this makes me fear that if the history of my achievements, which they tell me is in print, has been written by some magician who is no well-wisher to my glory, he has undoubtedly delivered many things with partiality, misrepresented my life, inserting a hundred falsehoods for one truth, and diverting himself with the relation of idle stories, foreign to the purpose, and unsuitable to the character of a true history. O envy! envy! thou gnawing worm of virtue, and spring of infinite mischiefs! there is no other vice, my Sancho, but pleads some pleasure in its excuse; but envy is always attended by disgust, rancour, and distracting rage." "I am much of your mind," said Sancho; "and I think, in the same book which neighbour Carrasco told us he had read of our lives, the story makes bold with my credit, and has handled it at a strange rate, and has dragged it about the kennels, as a body may say. Well now, as I am an honest man, I never spoke an ill word of a magician in my born days; and I think they need not envy my condition so much. The truth is, I am somewhat malicious; I have my roguish tricks now and then; but I was ever counted more fool than knave for all that, and so indeed I was bred and born; and if there were nothing else in me but my religion--for I firmly believe whatever our holy Church believes, and I hate the infidels mortally--these same historians should take pity on me, and spare me a little in their books. But let them say on to the end of the chapter; naked I came into the world, and naked must go out. It is all a case to Sancho, I can neither win nor lose by the bargain: and so my name be in print, and handed about, I care not a fig for the worst they can say of me." "What thou sayest, Sancho," answered Don Quixote, "puts me in mind of a story. A celebrated poet of our time wrote a very scurrilous and abusive lampoon upon all the intriguing ladies of the court, forbearing to name one, as not being sure whether she deserved to be put into the catalogue or not; but the lady not finding herself there, was not a little affronted at the omission, and made a great complaint to the poet, asking him what he had seen in her, that he should leave her out of his list; desiring him at the same time to enlarge his satire and put her in, or expect to hear farther from her. The author obeyed her commands, and gave her a character with a vengeance; and to her great satisfaction made her as famous for infamy as any woman about the town. Such another story is that of Diana's temple, one of the seven wonders of the world, burnt by an obscure fellow merely to eternise his name; which, in spite of an edict that enjoined all people never to mention it, either by word of mouth or in writing, yet is still known to have been Erostratus. The story of the great Emperor Charles the Fifth and a Roman knight, upon a certain occasion, is much the same. The emperor had a great desire to see the famous temple once called the Pantheon, but now more happily the church of All Saints. It is the only entire edifice remaining of heathen Rome, and that which best gives an idea of the glory and magnificence of its great founders. It is built in the shape of a half orange, of a vast extent, and very lightsome; though it admits no light but at one window, or, to speak more properly, at a round aperture on the top of the roof. The emperor being got up thither, and looking down from the brink upon the fabric, with a Roman knight by him, who shewed all the beauties of that vast edifice: after they were gone from the place, says the knight, addressing the emperor, 'It came into my head a thousand times, sacred sir, to embrace your majesty, and cast myself with you from the top of the church to the bottom, that I might thus purchase an immortal name.' 'I thank you,' said the emperor, 'for not doing it; and for the future I will give you no opportunity to put your loyalty to such a test. Therefore I banish you my presence for ever.' Which done, he bestowed some considerable favour on him. I tell thee, Sancho, this desire of honour is a strange bewitching thing. What dost thou think made Horatius, armed at all points, plunge headlong from the bridge into the rapid Tiber? What prompted Curtius to leap into the profound flaming gulf? What made Mutius burn his hand? What forced Caesar over the Rubicon, spite of all the omens that dissuaded his passage? And to instance a more modern example, what made the undaunted Spaniards sink their ships when under the most courteous Cortez, but that scorning the stale honour of this so often conquered world, they sought a maiden glory in a new scene of victory? These, and a multiplicity of other great actions, are owing to the immediate thirst and desire of fame, which mortals expect as the proper price and immortal recompense of their great actions. But we that are Christian catholic knights-errant must fix our hopes upon a higher reward, placed in the eternal and celestial regions, where we may expect a permanent honour and complete happiness; not like the vanity of fame, which at best is but the shadow of great actions, and must necessarily vanish, when destructive time has eat away the substance which it followed. So, my Sancho, since we expect a Christian reward, we must suit our actions to the rules of Christianity. In giants we must kill pride and arrogance; but our greatest foes, and whom we must chiefly combat, are within. Envy we must overcome by generosity and nobleness of soul; anger, by a reposed and easy mind; riot and drowsiness, by vigilance and temperance; and sloth, by our indefatigable peregrinations through the universe, to seek occasions of military as well as Christian honours. This, Sancho, is the road to lasting fame, and a good and honourable renown."

In such discourses as these the knight and squire passed the night and the whole succeeding day, without encountering any occasion to signalise themselves; at which Don Quixote was very much concerned. At last, towards evening the next day, they discovered the goodly city of Toboso, which revived the knight's spirits wonderfully, but had a quite contrary effect on his squire, because he did not know the house where Dulcinea lived any more than his master. So that the one was mad till he saw her, and the other very melancholic and disturbed in mind because he had never seen her; nor did he know what to do, should his master send him to Toboso. However, as Don Quixote would not make his entry in the daytime, they spent the evening among some oaks not far distant from the place, till the prefixed moment came; then they entered the city, where they met with adventures indeed.

CHAPTER XLI.
That gives an account of things which you will know when you have read it.

The sable night had spun out half her course, when Don Quixote and Sancho entered Toboso. A profound silence reigned over all the town, and the inhabitants were fast asleep, and stretched out at their ease. Nothing disturbed the general tranquillity but now and then the barking of dogs, that wounded Don Quixote's ears, but more poor Sancho's heart. Sometimes an ass brayed, hogs grunted, cats mewed; which jarring mixture of sounds was not a little augmented by the stillness and serenity of the night, and filled the enamoured champion's head with a thousand inauspicious chimeras. Nevertheless he said, "Sancho, lead on to Dulcinea's palace; it is possible we may find her awake." "To what palace?" answered Sancho; "that in which I saw her highness was but a little mean house." "It was, I suppose, some small apartment of her castle which she had retired to," said the knight, "to amuse herself with her damsels, as is usual with great ladies and princesses." "Since your worship," quoth Sancho, "will needs have my Lady Dulcinea's house to be a castle, is this an hour to find the gates open?" "First, however, let us find this castle," replied Don Quixote, "and then I will tell thee how to act;-but look, my eyes deceive me, or that huge dark pile yonder must be Dulcinea's palace." "Then lead on, sir," said Sancho; "it may be so; though, if I were to see it with my eyes, I will believe it just as much as that it is now day."
The Don led the way, and having gone about two hundred paces, he came up to the edifice which cast the dark shade; and perceiving a large tower, he soon found that the building was no palace, but the principal church of the place; whereupon he said, "We are come to the church, Sancho." "I see we are," answered Sancho; "and pray God we be not come to our graves; for it is no good sign to be rambling about churchyards at such hours, and especially since I have already told your worship that this same lady's house stands in a blind alley." "Blockhead!" said the knight; "where hast thou ever found castles and royal palaces built in blind alleys?" "Sir," said Sancho, "each country has its customs; so perhaps it is the fashion here to build your palaces in alleys; and so I beseech your worship to let me look among these lanes and alleys just before me; and perhaps I may pop upon this same palace, which I wish I may see devoured by dogs for bewildering us at this rate." "Speak with more respect, Sancho, of what regards my lady," said Don Quixote; "let us keep our holidays in peace, and not throw the rope after the bucket." "I will curb myself," answered Sancho; "but I cannot think that, though I have seen the house but once, your worship will needs have me find it at midnight, when you cannot find it yourself, though you must have seen it thousands of times." "Thou wilt make me desperate, Sancho," quoth Don Quixote; "come hither, heretic; have I not told thee a thousand times that I never saw the peerless Dulcinea in my life, nor ever stepped over the threshold of her palace, and that I am enamoured by report alone, and the great fame of her wit and beauty?" "I hear it now," said Sancho; "and to tell the truth, I have seen her just as much as your worship." "How can that be?" cried Don Quixote; "didst thou not tell me that thou sawest her winnowing wheat?" "Take no heed of that, sir," replied the squire; "for the fact is, her message, and the sight of her too, were both by hearsay, and I can no more tell who the Lady Dulcinea is than I can buffet the moon." "Sancho, Sancho," answered Don Quixote, "there is a time to jest, and a time when jests are unseasonable. What! because I say that I never saw nor spoke to the mistress of my soul, must thou say so likewise, when thou knowest it to be untrue?"

They were here interrupted by the approach of a man with two mules; and by the sound of a ploughshare, our travellers rightly guessed that he was a husbandman. The country-fellow having now come up to them, Don Quixote said to him, "Good-morrow, honest friend; canst thou direct me to the palace of the peerless princess, Donna Dulcinea del Toboso?" "Sir," answered the fellow, "I am a stranger here; for I have been but a few days in the service of a farmer of this town. But the parish priest, or the sexton across the road, can give your worship an account of that same lady princess; for they keep a register of all the inhabitants of Toboso; not that I think there is any princess living here, though there are several great ladies that may every one be a princess in her own house." "Among those, friend," said the Don, "may be her for whom I am inquiring." "Not unlikely," said the ploughman, "and so God speed you; for it will soon be daybreak." Then pricking on his mules, he waited for no more questions.
Sancho seeing his master perplexed, said to him, "Sir, the day comes on apace, and we shall soon have the sun upon us; so I think we had better get out of this place, and, while your worship takes shelter in some wood, I will leave not a corner unsearched for this house, castle, or palace of my lady; and it shall go hard with me but I find it; and as soon as I have done so, I will speak to her ladyship, and tell her where your worship is waiting her orders and directions how you may see her without damage to her honour and reputation." "Sancho," quoth Don Quixote, "thou hast uttered a thousand sentences in a few words. Thy counsel I relish much, and shall most willingly follow it. Come on, and let us seek for some shelter: then shalt thou return and seek out my lady, from whose discretion and courtesy I expect more than miraculous favours." Sancho was impatient till he got his master out of the town, lest his tricks should be detected; he therefore hastened on, and when they had gone about two miles, the knight retired to a shady grove, while the squire returned in quest of the Lady Dulcinea; on which embassy things occurred well worthy of credit and renewed attention.

CHAPTER XLII.
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.