DON QUIXOTE remained with Roque for three days, and they were hectic days for our knight. Roque always slept apart from his men, for the viceroy of Barcelona had placed a great price on his head, and Roque was in constant fear that some one in his band would be tempted to deliver him up. On the fourth day he and Don Quixote, accompanied by Sancho and six of the band, made their way toward Barcelona; and on the night of St. John's Eve they reached the city. There Roque took farewell of the knight and his squire, and returned to his haunts in the woods.
Throughout the night Don Quixote-kept guard over the city; and there he was still sitting on Rocinante when dawn appeared on the horizon, and Don Quixote and Sancho Panza for the first time in their lives beheld the sea. It seemed to them it was ever so much greater than any of the lakes they had seen in La Mancha. As the sun rose it was suddenly greeted with the ringing of bells, the dinof drums, the sound of clarions, and the trampling and clatter of feet on the streets; and from the galleys along the beach a mass of streamers in varied colors waved its welcome, to the music and the noise of bugles, clarions and trumpets from shipboard. Then cannons on ship and shore began to thunder, and a constant fire was kept up from the walls and fortress of the city. It was a noise and a spectacle that might have over-awed any one, even a less simple-minded person than Sancho, who stared open-mouthed at the wonders he beheld. He gasped when he saw the galleys rowed about by their oarsmen on the water, and he told his master he had never seen so many feet in his life. A troop of horsemen in extravagant liveries rode past them, where they were standing, and suddenly Don Quixote was startled by hearing some one call out in a loud voice: "Welcome to our city, mirror, beacon, star and cynosure of all knight-errantry in its widest extent! Welcome, I say, valiant Don Quixote of La Mancha! Not the false, the fictitious, the apocryphal one, but the true, the legitimate, the real one that Cid Hamet Benengeli, flower of historians, has described to us!"
Don Quixote felt flattered by the attention he suddenly attracted, for all eyes had turned to gaze upon his lean and queer person; although it may be said here, in confidence, that the man who had recognized the hero was no other than the one to whom the rogue Roque had written. The cavalier divulged his identity to Don Quixote, and begged him politely to accept his services while in Barcelona; and Don Quixote replied with as much courtesy that he wouldfollow him wherever he pleased and be entirely at his disposal. Then the horsemen closed in around him and they set out for the center of the city, to the music of a gay tune played by the clarions and drums.
The Devil, however, was not asleep. He put temptation into the hearts of some street urchins, who stole their way into the close proximity of Rocinante's and Dapple's hindquarters, and there deposited a bunch of furze under their tails, with the fatal result that their riders were flung headlong into the crowd. Our proud hero, covered with dust and shame, pulled himself together and went to pick the flowers from the tail of his hack, while Sancho extracted the cause of Dapple's capers from his own mount. Then they mounted again, the music continued to play, and soon they found themselves at a large and impressive house, which they learned was occupied by the cavalier, who was a friend of Roque's.
THE cavalier turned out to be one Don Antonio Moreno, a gentleman with a great sense of humor, well read and rich. As soon as Don Quixote had entered the house, Don Antonio persuaded him to discard the suit of armor; then he took him out on the balcony, where he at once attracted all the boys in the street and crowds ofpeople, who gazed at him as if he had been a monkey. The cavaliers passed in review before the balcony, and the knight was given the impression that it was in his special honor they were bedecked as they were, for he did not realize that it was a holiday. Sancho was delighted beyond description. He was treated royally by the servants, who thought that they had never met any one quite as amusing as he. Don Antonio's friends were all instructed to pay homage to Don Quixote and at all times to address him as if he were a knight errant.
The flattery and honors were too much for the poor knight: they turned his head completely, and he became puffed up with his own importance. Sancho, too, amused Don Antonio and his guests exceedingly, and they enjoyed particularly hearing about his escapades as governor.
After dinner that day, the host took Don Quixote into a distant room, which contained no furniture except a table, on which was a pedestal supporting a head made of what seemed to be bronze. After having acted in the most mysterious manner, and having carefully ascertained that all the doors to the room were shut and no one listening, Antonio swore the knight to secrecy. Then he proceeded to tell Don Quixote that the head he saw there before him had been made by a Polish magician, and possessed the magic faculty of being able to answer any question whispered into its ear. Only on certain days, however, did its magic assert itself, and the following day, which was the day after Friday—it had been astrologically worked out—would again witness the miracle. DonAntonio asked the knight whether there was anything he should especially like to ask the head; if so, he could put the question to it on the morrow. Don Quixote seemed sceptical, but made no comment, and they returned to the other guests.
In the afternoon the knight errant was placed on a tall mule, bedecked with beautiful trimmings, and himself encased in a heavy and uncomfortably warm garb of yellow cloth; then, unbeknown to him, they pinned on his back a parchment with this inscription in large letters:This is Don Quixote of La Mancha.
As they were parading through the streets the knight's vanity swelled more and more, for from every nook and corner there came great shouts of recognition. Soon he was unable to restrain his vainglorious nature, and he turned to his host and remarked to him with much satisfaction: "Great are the privileges knight-errantry involves, for it makes him who professes it known and famous in every region of the earth. See, Don Antonio, even the very boys of this city know me without ever having seen me." Finally the crowds increased so that Don Antonio was obliged to remove the parchment, and soon they had to take refuge in his house.
In the evening Don Antonio's wife gave a dance, and it was amusing to see the tall and lank hero move about on the ballroom floor; the men gave him the opportunity to dance every dance, for they themselves enjoyed watching him better than dancing. At last Don Quixote was so exhausted both by the dancing and by the lovemaking thatthe ladies had imposed on him—and how they delighted in hearing him avow his great love for Dulcinea—that Sancho had to take him to his room and put him to bed.
The next day Don Antonio took his wife, Don Quixote, and a few intimate friends into the secret chamber, and after many mysterious preliminaries, the questioning of the head began. All seemed particularly interested in what Don Quixote would have to ask, and felt rewarded when his turn came, for this is what he demanded: "Tell me, thou that answerest, was that which happened to me in the cave of Montesinos the truth or a dream? Will my squire Sancho's whipping be accomplished without fail? Will the disenchantment of Dulcinea be brought about?"
In a mysterious voice that seemed to come from a great distance, the head returned these answers: "As to the question of the cave, there is much to be said; there is something of both in it. Sancho's whipping will proceed leisurely. The disenchantment of Dulcinea will attain its due consummation."
Don Quixote heaved a sigh and declared that if only his peerless one were disenchanted, it would be all the good fortune he could wish for. Then Sancho tried his luck; but at the conclusion of Sancho's audience with the head, he did not seem properly awed, and his master became displeased with his pretentious expectations and reprimanded him severely in the presence of the whole company.
All the while Sancho's incessant talking and his master's exalted behavior kept every one in an uproarious humor. The joke that Don Antonio had arranged consisted in having a student, a young nephew of Don Antonio's, placed ina chamber underneath the one in which the head was, to receive the questions and speak the replies through a tube that led from the inside of the head to the room below. Soon after this form of amusement had taken place, it was agreed upon by the gentlemen of the city to arrange for a tilting at the ring, for they were convinced that such an exhibition would afford greater opportunities for mirth and laughter than anything else they might think of.
One day Don Quixote and Sancho, accompanied by two of Don Antonio's servants, were walking on foot through the city, when they suddenly passed a printing shop; and, never having seen one, the knight entered with Sancho and the servants. He was as curious as usual, and asked the printer innumerable questions about the books that he was printing. He saw some of the printers reading the proofs of a book, and he turned to them and inquired what the title of the book was. They told him it was the Second Part of "The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha," adding that it was written by a certain person of Tordesillas. Upon hearing this, Don Quixote grew quite cold in his demeanor, and having moralized that fiction resembling truth is always greater than absurdly untruthful stories, he uttered a hope that the book would be burned to ashes. And then he turned his back on the astonished men and left the shop in great haste.
THE afternoon of that same day Don Antonio took Don Quixote and Sancho on board one of the galleys, amid all the honors that accompany the visits of great and famous personages. There were fanfares, and cheers, and the firing of guns, and all the high-ranking officers of the army and navy who were in the city had been appealed to by Don Antonio Moreno and turned out to pay him their respects.
Don Quixote was delighted. He could scarcely find words to express his appreciation of such a magnificent and royal reception; and Sancho was almost carried away by the honors that were being paid his master. But when he saw all the men at the oars—stripped to the skin by the captain's command—he became afraid, for they seemed to him like so many devils.
When Don Quixote and Sancho Panza had been presented to all the dignitaries, the captain escorted them to a platform on which he begged them to take their seats beside him. Sancho sat at the edge of the platform, next to one of the rowing devils (who had been instructed in advance by the captain what to do) and suddenly he felt himself lifted in the air by a pair of strong, muscular arms. The next instant he was in the clutches of another devil;and passing from hand to hand, he went the rounds of the crew with such swiftness that the poor superstitious Sancho did not know whether he was dead, dreaming, or alive. Sancho's aërial expedition did not come to an end until he had been most unceremoniously deposited on the poop, where he landed in a strangely unbalanced condition—to the tremendous amusement of the crew and the onlookers. He was so dazed that it is doubtful whether he would have known his name, if he had been asked.
Seeing what had happened to his squire, Don Quixote thought it best to forestall himself from being put through any such ceremony; so he stood up, his hand on the hilt of his sword, and announced with fire in his eyes that any one who dared to attempt such a thing to him would suffer by having his head cut off. He had hardly finished his sentence before a noise was heard that frightened Sancho almost into insensibility. He thought that Heaven was coming off its hinges and about to fall on his sinful head. And even Don Quixote trembled with something closely akin to fear, and grew (if that were possible) pale under his yellow hue.
What the crew had done was to strike the awning and lower the yard and then hoist it up again with as much clatter and speed as they could produce, yet without uttering any human sound. This being done, the boatswain gave orders to weigh anchor, and as he went about on deck signaling with a whistle, he continually lashed and beat the backs of the naked oarsmen with a whip he had in his hand.
When Sancho saw all the red oars moving, he took themto be the feet of enchanted beings, and he thought to himself: "It is these that are the real enchanted things, and not the ones my master talks of. What can those wretches have done to be whipped in that way; and how does that one man who goes along there whistling dare to whip so many? I declare this is Hell, or at least Purgatory!"
But when Don Quixote noticed his squire's interest in the naked creatures at the oars, he turned and said to him softly: "Ah, Sancho my friend, how quickly and cheaply you might finish off the disenchantment of Dulcinea, if you would strip to the waist and take your place among those gentlemen! Amid the pain and sufferings of so many you would not feel your own much; and, moreover, perhaps the sage Merlin would allow each of these lashes, being laid on with a good hand, to count for ten of those which you must give yourself at last."
But Sancho was not to be persuaded, and the general of the fortress, who was eager to know why Sancho was urged to lash himself, could not wait for a reply to his question, for there loomed up on the horizon a ship which attracted his attention, and he immediately gave orders to the captain to steer down upon it.
After an adventure on the seas, the first they had ever experienced, Don Quixote and Sancho came back to Barcelona that afternoon, and returned to the house of their host, escorted by the Viceroy, the General and the other high dignitaries.
A FEW days after Don Quixote had visited the galley, he was riding along the beach one morning on Rocinante dressed in his armor, when suddenly he observed coming toward him a knight, also in full regalia, with a shining moon painted on his shield. As he came close to Don Quixote, he held in his horse, and spoke to our knight thus: "Illustrious knight, and never sufficiently extolled Don Quixote of La Mancha, I am the Knight of the White Moon, whose unheard-of achievements will perhaps recall him to thy memory. I come to do battle with thee and prove the might of thy arm, to the end that I make thee acknowledge and confess that my lady, let her be who she may, is incomparably fairer than thy Dulcinea del Toboso."
And then the Knight of the White Moon went on to say that should he conquer Don Quixote, the Knight of the Lions must retire to his native village for a period of one year, and live there in peace and quiet, away from all knightly endeavors and deeds. Should, however, Don Quixote turn out to be the victor, he, the challenger, would gladly forfeit his head, as well as the renown of his many deeds and conquests, his arms and horse to him. He badeDon Quixote consider the challenge and give a speedy answer, for he had but that day at his disposal for the combat.
Don Quixote was taken aback at the audacity and arrogance with which the knight had stated his demands, particularly when he took into consideration that he had never in his whole life heard him even spoken of, much less had he heard of the deeds and victorious combats he had named. But he accepted the challenge with calm pride on the conditions the Knight of the White Moon had given, barring the one which involved transferring his renown to Don Quixote's shoulders in case of his being vanquished. To our knight that seemed like taking too great chances, since he had no idea what the nature of the challenger's deeds might be, and since he was thoroughly satisfied with his own achievements.
It so happened that the Viceroy had observed the Knight of the White Moon in conversation with Don Quixote, and thinking that some one had planned another joke on him, he hastened to Don Antonio's house, and got him to accompany him to the beach, where they found the two knights just taking their distance, and about to commence the combat. Don Antonio was as startled when he saw the other knight as the Viceroy had been, and neither one could make up his mind whether the whole thing was a joke, or not, for no one there seemed to know who the Knight of the White Moon was. However, the two gentlemen at last decided it could be nothing but a prank, planned by some gentleman for his own amusement. The Viceroy then turned to the knight and, learning that thecombat was being fought to decide a question of precedence of beauty, bade them set to if both of them still remained unshaken and inflexible in their convictions. The two combatants, having thanked the Viceroy for his permission, separated and again took up the necessary distance. Their horses wheeled around and the knights came against each other with all the speed their mounts were capable of. But the Knight of the White Moon was mounted on a steed that completely outshone the poor Rocinante, for when they clashed, the poor hack fell from the mere force of the contact, and Don Quixote leaped over his head onto earth. At once the unknown knight held his lance over his visor and threatened him with death unless he confessed to being vanquished and acknowledged that he would abide by the conditions of the combat.
In a feeble voice Don Quixote answered him that in spite of his defeat Dulcinea still was the most beautiful woman in the world, but that now that his honor had been taken away from him, he might as well die; and he begged the knight to drive home the blow of his lance. But the Knight of the White Moon was a generous gentleman. He said he would not have our hero deny the beauty of his Dulcinea in deference to his own lady; all that he asked was that Don Quixote return to his village of La Mancha and give up knight-errantry as he had promised. Don Quixote rose in a sorry and battered condition and swore that he would keep his word like a true knight errant; and in the next instant the mysterious Knight of the White Moon set off toward the city at a quick canter.
As soon as the unknown knight had left, the Viceroy, Don Antonio and Sancho hastened to Don Quixote's side. They found him covered with perspiration and stiff in all his limbs. Rocinante had not yet stirred, for he, too, was in a deplorable condition. Sancho for once had lost his speech, and all that had happened to his master in so short a time seemed to him proof that the enchanters were still pursuing him. Now that his master for some time to come was to be confined to their own village, there would be no chance for him to redeem the promise he had made to his squire. Altogether it seemed to Sancho a sad state of affairs.
Don Quixote was in such a dilapidated condition that he had to be carried into the city in a hand-chair which the Viceroy had sent for, and they all escorted him to the house of Don Antonio.
IN the city the Viceroy and Don Antonio tried to locate the Knight of the White Moon, and when they had found the hostel at which he was staying Don Antonio went to call on him and learned that he was the bachelor Samson Carrasco, from the very same village as Don Quixote. The bachelor, having explained his aims regarding the knight, packed his arms in a knapsack, took leave assoon as he had told his story, and set off at once for La Mancha, mounted on a mule.
A few days later, much to the sorrow of Sancho—who had never been so well fed in his life—Don Quixote and he took a fond farewell of their estimable and generous host who had heaped so many honors on them and who had enjoyed himself so tremendously at their expense. This time it was a sad and lonely journey on which they started. Don Quixote was mounted on Rocinante, who had somewhat recovered from his shock, but Sancho had to tread the trail on foot, for his Dapple had to serve as a carrier for the discarded armor of our late and lamented valiant Knight of the Lions.
TOWARD the end of the fifth day Don Quixote was resting in the shade of some trees, and as always happened when he lay down to rest, his thoughts turned to the disenchantment of his Dulcinea and a feeling of impatience with his selfish and uncharitable squire rose up within him. He pleaded with Sancho and implored him to go through with the ordeal bravely; but Sancho was unflinching in his stubbornness and insisted he could see noreason why he should be coupled with the disenchantment of the peerless fair one. Thus Don Quixote could only pray that his squire might be moved by compassion to perform some day the deed that would liberate his lady.
While discussing this subject so close to his heart Don Quixote had decided to pursue his journey, and while they were traveling along on the road to their village they again engaged in conversation. Suddenly they found themselves passing the spot where they had been trampled on by the bulls, but Don Quixote, not wishing to have his thoughts return to anything so bitter, turned to Sancho and remarked that this was where they had encountered the gay shepherds and shepherdesses. And the next instant he had decided to emulate their example and turn shepherd himself, now that his calling of knight errant had come to an end; he would buy some ewes, he said, and together they would retire to some quiet pastoral nook where the woods and the fields met, and where pure crystal water sprang from the ledge of a rock and the fragrance of flowers was in the air. And there he would sing to Dulcinea, his platonic and only love. The thought of a life so calm and so far away from danger and knightly adventures pleased Sancho so greatly and made his enthusiasm run so high that he could not restrain a row of proverbs from falling from his lips. It was a flow so incessant that Don Quixote at last felt obliged to ask for a truce.
Night had now fallen, and Don Quixote thought it best to withdraw from the roadway and take refuge for the night some distance away from it. Having supped, Sancho at once fell asleep, but his master sat up all that night,thinking of Dulcinea and making up rhymes to the sweetness of her memory.
DON QUIXOTE could not bear to see his squire sleep so restfully while he was being weighted down by all the cares of the world. So he woke Sancho, whose stolid unconcern about Dulcinea again was brought home to him, and almost went on his knees in order to induce him to scourge himself. He nearly wept in his efforts to have Sancho inflict the meager amount of three or four hundred lashes upon himself; but as ever the cruel squire remained unmoved. Don Quixote did everything in his power to entice him to do this beautiful deed of sacrifice. He held forth to him what a blessed night it would be for them, if he would only comply with his master's request, for then, Don Quixote suggested, they could spend the remainder of it singing, thus making this the beginning of the pastoral life to which they were about to devote themselves. But Sancho said he was no monk; and the idea of getting up in the middle of the night to perform such rituals did not appeal to him, he frankly avowed. The bewailings of his master, both in Castilian and in Latin, made no impression upon the hard-hearted Sancho, who remained as firm as the rock of Gibraltar, as far as the disenchantment was concerned.
Don Quixote had just made up his mind that it was a useless task to try to prevail upon Sancho at that hour to do his duty, when suddenly there was heard a tremendous and terrifying noise, which increased as it seemed to come closer. Sancho was so frightened that he at once took refuge behind Dapple, entrenching himself between the pack-saddle and his master's discarded armor; and Don Quixote got palpitation of the heart, and began to shiver. As Sancho peeped from behind his entrenchments and Don Quixote took courage to look, the grunting drove of six hundred pigs—for that is what it was—was so close upon them that in the next moment they found themselves knocked to the ground; but it was some time before all of the snorting, disrespectful animals had passed their dirty feet over the prostrate bodies of the knight, his squire and their beasts and provisions.
Sancho rose first, smeared with dirt, and having been stirred to unusual depths by the condition in which he found himself, he begged his master to let him take his sword, saying he felt he had to kill some of the pigs in order to be soothed. The exceedingly bad manners they had displayed and especially the fact that they had crushed all the provisions into nothingness, had produced an ire in Sancho that seemed wellnigh irrepressible.
But Don Quixote calmed his squire with these words, spoken with a melancholy air: "Let them be, my friend. This insult is the penalty of my sin, and it is the righteous chastisement of Heaven that jackals should devour a vanquished knight, and wasps sting him and pigs trample him under foot."
To this Sancho Panza retorted pensively: "I suppose it is the chastisement of Heaven, too, that flies should prick the squires of vanquished knights, and lice eat them, and hunger assail them. If we squires were the sons of the knights we serve, or their very near relations, it would be no wonder if the penalty of their misdeeds descended upon us, even to the fourth generation. But what have the Panzas to do with the Quixotes? Well, let us lie down again and sleep out what little of the night there is left, and God will send us dawn and we shall be all right."
Sancho lay down and slept, but his master sat up and commenced his emulation of the life of a shepherd by singing the song he had composed to his great love, accompanying it with his own sighs, and many wet tears. At last daylight came, and the sun awakened them both. Sancho began to rub his eyes, and they both got up and made ready to journey further. But before leaving Sancho again cursed the pigs for having ruined his stores.
He and his master had traveled the whole day, when they encountered a number of men on horseback, and four or five men on foot, all heavily armed. Don Quixote's heart ached, for he could not forget his promise to the Knight of the White Moon. The men who were mounted approached our hero and Sancho, and surrounded them without speaking a word. Don Quixote attempted to ask a question, but one of them warned him to be silent by putting a finger to his lips, while another one pointed his lance against the knight's breast. Still another one took Rocinante by the bridle; while Sancho was being treated in the same manner by some of the others. BothDon Quixote and Sancho began to be worried as to the outcome of this adventure, for the whole proceeding seemed to them utterly mysterious.
They rode all that day, unable to make out where they were being taken, or who their mysterious captors were, and at last night came. All the while the men were calling them all kinds of names, such as "bloodthirsty lions," "cannibals," "murderous Polyphemes" etc.; and Sancho was scared out of his wits, while Don Quixote was at his wits ends. Both were convinced that some terrible misfortune was in store for them, and they could only pray that they would get out of it as easily as possible.
Before they knew it, it was midnight, and soon after that Don Quixote recognized a castle, which he saw in the distance, as that of the Duke. He was amazed when he found that the men were taking him there, and he said to himself: "God bless me! What does this mean? It is all courtesy and politeness in this house; but with the vanquished, good turns into evil, and evil into worse." They entered the court, and found it arrayed in such a manner that they could not help being amazed and speechless, and they felt fear creeping into their hearts.
AS soon as the horsemen had dismounted, they and the men on foot carried Don Quixote and Sancho bodily into the center of the court, which was illuminated with hundreds of torches and lamps placed all around it. In the very center there was a catafalque, elevated to a height of several yards above the ground and covered by a huge canopy of black velvet. To the catafalque steps led from all around, and on the steps were hundreds of wax tapers burning in silver candlesticks. On the catafalque lay the dead body of a beautiful maiden. On one side of the stage there was a large platform on which sat two figures, with scepters in their hands and crowns on their heads: judging by this, Don Quixote thought they must be royal personages. On the side of this platform were two empty chairs, to which Don Quixote and Sancho were led. And when they had seated themselves and turned around to observe what was going to happen, they were suddenly startled by seeing their friends, the Duke and the Duchess, mount the platform and seat themselves next to the royalty.
Don Quixote and Sancho both paid them homage by rising and bowing profoundly, and the ducal pair returnedtheir compliment with a slight bow of the head. Following them came a long row of attendants. Then suddenly Don Quixote came to realize that the corpse was none other than that of the fair Altisidora, whose love he had scorned, and that shocked him greatly.
Some one connected with the ceremonies passed at that moment and threw a robe of black buckram covered with painted red flames of fire over Sancho and, removing his cap, put on his head a miter of the kind that those who were undergoing the sentence of the Holy Office wore. At the same time he whispered in Sancho's ear that if he opened his lips, his life would not be safe.
At first Sancho, seeing all the flames that seemed to be licking his body, got frightened, but when he found that no heat ensued and nothing else happened, his worries ceased. In the next moment his and his master's attention was attracted by low, sweet sounds of music and singing that seemed to vibrate from underneath the catafalque; and then there appeared a youth with a harp, and he sang a song that dealt with the cruelty of Don Quixote toward the fair Altisidora, who now was dead from a broken heart.
When he had sung of her charms, one of the two who seemed like kings rose from his seat and spoke. He, Minos, who sat in judgment with Rhadamanthus, now begged the latter to stand up and announce what must be done in order to affect the resuscitation and restoration of the damsel Altisidora. As soon as he had declaimed all he had to say, he sat down, and in the next moment Rhadamanthus rose and decreed that all the officials gather quickly and attach the person of Sancho Panza, as throughhim alone Altisidora's restoration could be effected, he said, by his receiving twenty-four smacks in the face, twelve pinches and six pin-thrusts in the back and arms.
Nobody but Sancho objected to the King's proclamation; but Sancho was emphatic enough for a multitude. "Body of me!" he replied unhesitatingly. "What has mauling my face got to with the resurrection of this damsel? The old woman takes kindly to my persecution; they enchant Dulcinea, and whip me in order to disenchant her. Altisidora dies of ailments God was pleased to send her, and to bring her to life they must give me four-and-twenty smacks, and prick holes in my body with pins, and raise weals on my arms with pinches! Try those jokes on a brother-in-law; I am an old dog, and its no use with me."
But Rhadamanthus was bent in carrying out his threat. He gave a sign to one of the attendants, and in the next moment a procession of duennas started toward Sancho with raised hands. Sancho saw them coming against him, he grew frantic, and began to bellow like a bull, crying out: "I might let myself be handled by all the world; but allow duennas to touch me? Not a bit of it! Scratch my face, as my master was served in this very castle; run me through the body with burnished daggers; pinch my arms with red-hot pincers; I shall bear all in patience to serve these gentlefolk; but I will not let duennas touch me, though the devil himself should carry me off!"
Here Don Quixote thought it was time for him to add his plea to that of the King, and he began to reason with Sancho. At last he subdued him somewhat, and by that time the duennas had reached the spot where Don Quixoteand Sancho were seated, and one of them came up, curtsied, and gave the poor squire a smack on the face that nearly unseated him, and that made him exclaim: "Less politeness and less paint, Señora Duenna. By God, your hands smell of vinegar-wash!"
No sooner had Sancho uttered these words than he was smacked and pinched by nearly all the rest of them, until at last he lost his temper and seized a lighted torch, with which he pursued the flying duennas in an uncontrollable rage, crying: "Begone, ye ministers of Hell! I am not made of brass not to feel such out-of-the-way tortures."
But just then Altisidora—who probably was tired of lying on her back such a long time—moved, and in the next moment exclamations were heard from all in the court: "Altisidora is alive! Altisidora lives!"
Now that the great miracle had been attained, Rhadamanthus turned to Sancho and bade him still his anger; and Don Quixote again entreated Sancho, since he so nobly had proven that virtue now was ripe in him, to go to work and disenchant his Dulcinea in the same breath. To this Sancho replied:
"That is trick upon trick, I think, and not honey upon pancakes. A nice thing it would be for a whipping to come now, on the top of pinches, smacks, and pin-proddings! You had better take a big stone and tie it round my neck, and pitch me into a well; I should not mind it much, if I am to be always made the cow of the wedding for the cure of other people's ailments. Leave me alone; or else by the Lord I shall fling the whole thing to the dogs, come what may!"
By this time Altisidora had entirely recovered from her death and was now sitting up on the catafalque. The music was again heard, the voices sang, and all came forward to help the young maiden down from her elevated position.
Altisidora acted as if she were just coming out of a long, long sleep; and when she saw the Kings and the Duke and the Duchess she bowed her head to them in respect. Then she asked the Lord to forgive Don Quixote for his cruelty, while she praised and thanked Sancho Panza for his sacrifice, and offered to give him six smocks of hers to make into shirts for himself, adding that if they were not quite whole, they were at least all clean. On hearing this, Sancho fell on his knees and kissed her hands; and then one of the attendants approached him, at the order of the Duke, and asked him to return the red robe and the miter. Sancho, however, wanted to keep them to show to his villagers as a remembrance of his marvelous experience; and when the Duchess heard of his desire she commanded that they be given to her friend as a token of her everlasting esteem.
Soon everybody had left the court and retired to their quarters, and the Duke had Don Quixote and Sancho shown to their old chambers.
SANCHO slept that night in the same chamber with Don Quixote. It was some time before he went asleep, however, for the pain of the pinching and smacking was quite evident. Don Quixote was inclined to talk, but Sancho begged him to let him sleep in peace for the remainder of the night, and at last both master and servant fell into slumber.
In the meantime it might be told how it came about that Don Quixote came to visit the ducal castle again. The bachelor Samson Carrasco, having learned as much as he could from the page that carried the letter to Teresa Panza of the whereabouts of the hero, decided that the time had come for another combat with him. Thus he procured a new suit of armor and a fresh horse and set out to find the Duke's castle. Having reached it, he had a long conversation with the Duke, wherein he told him it was his great desire to bring Don Quixote back to his village and his friends, hoping that if he could defeat him in battle Don Quixote could be made to return of his own free will and in time be cured of his strange affliction. He then followed him to Saragossa, for which city he had set out whenhe left the Duke's castle, but finally traced him to Barcelona, where the bachelor encountered him with the result that he promised to return to his village and give up knight-errantry for a year.
On his way home, the bachelor, at the Duke's request, had stopped at the castle to inform him of the outcome of the combat, and it was then that the Duke decided to play the knight and his squire another joke. The Duke had his men stationed everywhere on the road that led from Barcelona, and it was thus that they were able to bring in Don Quixote in the manner and at the hour that they did.
When daylight arrived the morning after Altisidora's coming to life, Don Quixote awoke and found her in his presence; and the instant he saw her he showed his modesty and his confusion by pulling the sheet over his head. But while Don Quixote was not inclined to converse with a maiden so early in the morning, Sancho showed no aversion to it whatever, for he bombarded Altisidora with all kinds of impertinent questions as to what was going on in Hell when she was there. Of course Altisidora denied having any intimate knowledge of this place, for in spite of her immodesty she had only got as far as the gates, she said.
Don Quixote now entered into the conversation and asked why the fair Altisidora had been so persistent in her love, when she knew that he would never change or give up his beloved Dulcinea, to whom he maintained he was born to belong. When she heard Don Quixote talk in this manner, Altisidora grew very angry with him, and exclaimed: "God's life! Don Stockfish, soul of a mortar, stone of a date, more obstinate and obdurate than a clownasked a favor when he has his mind made up! If I fall upon you I shall tear your eyes out! Do you fancy, then, Don Vanquished, Don Cudgeled, that I died foryoursake? All that you have seen to-night has been make believe; I am not the woman to let the black of my nail suffer for such a camel, much less die!"
Sancho interrupted her here and said he could well believe that; then he added: "All that about lovers pining to death is absurd. They may talk of it, but as far as doing it—Judas may believe that!"
Now the Duke and the Duchess entered, and after an animated conversation during which Sancho's amusing sayings as usual captivated his distinguished friends, Don Quixote begged leave to be on his way to his village. They granted him his request, and then they asked him whether he had forgiven Altisidora for having tried to capture his love. He replied saying that this lady's lack of virtue had its root in her idleness, and he recommended that the Duchess see to it that Altisidora was put to making lace or given some other employment. Sancho approved of his master's advice, and remarked sagely that he never had seen any lacemaker die for love; and he further illustrated the truth of Don Quixote's remark by his own experience on that score: when he was digging, he vowed, he never bothered with the thought of his old woman. The testimony of two such staunch friends of hers as Don Quixote and Sancho made the Duchess promise that hereafter she would keep the fair Altisidora employed so that no foolish thoughts might take her away from the path of virtue. As soon as the fair maiden heard her mistress speak thus,however, she assured her that there was no longer any need of her being worked to death in order to divert her thought from the person of our knight errant, for his cruelty to her had been such that the very thought of that had now blotted him out of her memory forever. And, pretending to wipe a tear from her eye, she made a curtsy to the Duchess and left the chamber.
It was now time for dinner, and soon afterward Don Quixote, having dined with the Duke and the Duchess, made his departure from the castle with Sancho, and started again for his home.
DON QUIXOTE and Sancho traveled along, both in a state of depression. Don Quixote was sad because he had been forced to give up the glories of knight-errantry and chivalry; Sancho because Altisidora had not kept her word when she promised to give him the smocks. To Sancho it seemed a terrible injustice that physicians should be paid even if their patients died, and here he had brought back a human being from the dead, and was being rewarded in this ungrateful manner!
But Don Quixote's sadness was suddenly brightened by a hope that he might at last be able to prevail upon Sancho to bring about the disenchantment of Dulcinea. Knowing Sancho's covetousness, he offered him money as a bribe.Now Sancho became interested, and consented, for the love of his wife and children, to whip himself at a price of a quarter-real a lash, generously throwing the five lashes he had already given himself into the bargain.
"O blessed Sancho! O dear Sancho!" exclaimed Don Quixote. "How we shall be bound to serve thee, Dulcinea and I, all the days of our lives that Heaven may grant us! But look here, Sancho: when wilt thou begin the scourging? For if thou wilt make short work of it, I will give thee a hundred reals over and above."
Sancho swore that he would begin the scourging that very night, and begged his master that he arrange it so that they spend the night in the open.
Night came at last, and when they had supped, Sancho proceeded to make a sturdy whip out of Dapple's halter. When he had finished this task he made off for a distant part of the woods. He left his master with such a determined look in his eyes that Don Quixote thought it best to warn him not to go too fast but to take a breathing-space between lashes so that he would not cut his body to pieces. He was afraid also, he said, that Sancho might become so enthusiastic over what he was doing, or so anxious to come to the end of the lashes that he might overtax his strength, collapse and die; and he begged Sancho particularly not to do that, for then he would have gone through all his suffering in vain. When Sancho had stripped himself to the waist, Don Quixote placed himself where he could hear the sound of the lashes, and counted them on his rosary that Sancho would make neither too much nor too little effort to disenchant Dulcinea.
After half a dozen lashes, Sancho felt that he had inflicted a sufficient measure of pain upon himself already, and demanded a higher price for his service. Don Quixote told Sancho that he would pay him twice the amount promised; and the squire began again. But this time he did not whip himself but let the lashes fall on a tree;and with each lash he gave out the most heartrending cries, and uttered such groans that his master began to feel the pain of his squire's torture in his own heart. When he had counted a thousand lashes or thereabout, he was quite worried about Sancho and begged him to stop for the present, but Sancho told his master he might as well brave the remainder of the ordeal now.
Seeing his squire in such a sacrificing mood, Don Quixote retired at his request, and Sancho continued with the lashing, which he administered to a perfectly innocent tree with such brutality and ferocity that the bark flew in all directions. All the while he gave vent to his pain by fierce shrieks, and then there came one long agonizing cry, which nearly rent Don Quixote's heart, and Sancho exclaimed piteously: "Here dies Sancho, and all with him!" Don Quixote hastened to his squire's side, and insisted for the sake of his unsupported wife and children that he go no further, but to wait until some other time with the rest. Sancho retorted with a request that his master cover his shoulders with his cloak, as the exertion had been too great and had made him perspire freely, and he did not wish to run the risk of catching cold. Don Quixote did as he was asked and begged Sancho to lie down; then he covered him with the cloak.
At dawn they resumed their journey, and when they had traveled three leagues, they came to an inn. Don Quixote did not take it for a castle this time; as a matter of fact, ever since he had found himself vanquished, he had begun to talk of and see things in a more rational way. They entered, and when Sancho saw the painted pictures on the wall he remarked to his master that not long from now there would be paintings picturing their deeds in every tavern and inn in the country. Don Quixote then turned to his squire and asked him whether he would like to finish the whipping business that day, and Sancho said it made no difference to him when he did it; he only made a suggestion that he thought he would prefer to do it among the trees as they seemed to help him bear the pain miraculously. But on second consideration Don Quixote deemed it advisable to put it off till a later time, when they were closer to their village, in case Sancho should have a breakdown as a result of his flogging himself. Their conversation came to an end when Sancho began to shoot proverbs at his master out of the corner of his mouth at such a speed that Don Quixote was overwhelmed and tore his hair in desperation.
WHEN they had left the inn that day Don Quixote and his squire traveled all through the night, and the following morning they arrived at their own village,from which they had been absent so long. Among the first to meet them were the curate and Samson Carrasco, who had discovered at a distance the red robe the Duchess had given to Sancho as a memento of their friendship. Sancho had thrown it over his donkey and the discarded armor, and it shone in the morning sun as brightly as a fiery sunset. Dapple was also adorned with the miter, which proudly crowned the beast's head.