PART II - CHAPTER XVI.

by Miguel de Cervantes

　　OF WHAT BEFELL DON QUIXOTE WITH A DISCREET GENTLEMAN OF LA MANCHADon Quixote pursued his journey in the high spirits, satisfaction, andself-complacency already described, fancying himself the most valorousknight-errant of the age in the world because of his late victory. Allthe adventures that could befall him from that time forth he regarded asalready done and brought to a happy issue; he made light of enchantmentsand enchanters; he thought no more of the countless drubbings that hadbeen administered to him in the course of his knight-errantry, nor of thevolley of stones that had levelled half his teeth, nor of the ingratitudeof the galley slaves, nor of the audacity of the Yanguesans and theshower of stakes that fell upon him; in short, he said to himself thatcould he discover any means, mode, or way of disenchanting his ladyDulcinea, he would not envy the highest fortune that the most fortunateknight-errant of yore ever reached or could reach.He was going along entirely absorbed in these fancies, when Sancho saidto him, "Isn't it odd, senor, that I have still before my eyes thatmonstrous enormous nose of my gossip, Tom Cecial?""And dost thou, then, believe, Sancho," said Don Quixote, "that theKnight of the Mirrors was the bachelor Carrasco, and his squire TomCecial thy gossip?""I don't know what to say to that," replied Sancho; "all I know is thatthe tokens he gave me about my own house, wife and children, nobody elsebut himself could have given me; and the face, once the nose was off, wasthe very face of Tom Cecial, as I have seen it many a time in my town andnext door to my own house; and the sound of the voice was just the same.""Let us reason the matter, Sancho," said Don Quixote. "Come now, by whatprocess of thinking can it be supposed that the bachelor Samson Carrascowould come as a knight-errant, in arms offensive and defensive, to fightwith me? Have I ever been by any chance his enemy? Have I ever given himany occasion to owe me a grudge? Am I his rival, or does he profess arms,that he should envy the fame I have acquired in them?""Well, but what are we to say, senor," returned Sancho, "about thatknight, whoever he is, being so like the bachelor Carrasco, and hissquire so like my gossip, Tom Cecial? And if that be enchantment, as yourworship says, was there no other pair in the world for them to take thelikeness of?""It is all," said Don Quixote, "a scheme and plot of the malignantmagicians that persecute me, who, foreseeing that I was to be victoriousin the conflict, arranged that the vanquished knight should display thecountenance of my friend the bachelor, in order that the friendship Ibear him should interpose to stay the edge of my sword and might of myarm, and temper the just wrath of my heart; so that he who sought to takemy life by fraud and falsehood should save his own. And to prove it, thouknowest already, Sancho, by experience which cannot lie or deceive, howeasy it is for enchanters to change one countenance into another, turningfair into foul, and foul into fair; for it is not two days since thousawest with thine own eyes the beauty and elegance of the peerlessDulcinea in all its perfection and natural harmony, while I saw her inthe repulsive and mean form of a coarse country wench, with cataracts inher eyes and a foul smell in her mouth; and when the perverse enchanterventured to effect so wicked a transformation, it is no wonder if heeffected that of Samson Carrasco and thy gossip in order to snatch theglory of victory out of my grasp. For all that, however, I consolemyself, because, after all, in whatever shape he may have been, I havevictorious over my enemy.""God knows what's the truth of it all," said Sancho; and knowing as hedid that the transformation of Dulcinea had been a device and impositionof his own, his master's illusions were not satisfactory to him; but hedid not like to reply lest he should say something that might disclosehis trickery.As they were engaged in this conversation they were overtaken by a manwho was following the same road behind them, mounted on a very handsomeflea-bitten mare, and dressed in a gaban of fine green cloth, with tawnyvelvet facings, and a montera of the same velvet. The trappings of themare were of the field and jineta fashion, and of mulberry colour andgreen. He carried a Moorish cutlass hanging from a broad green and goldbaldric; the buskins were of the same make as the baldric; the spurs werenot gilt, but lacquered green, and so brightly polished that, matching asthey did the rest of his apparel, they looked better than if they hadbeen of pure gold.When the traveller came up with them he saluted them courteously, andspurring his mare was passing them without stopping, but Don Quixotecalled out to him, "Gallant sir, if so be your worship is going our road,and has no occasion for speed, it would be a pleasure to me if we were tojoin company.""In truth," replied he on the mare, "I would not pass you so hastily butfor fear that horse might turn restive in the company of my mare.""You may safely hold in your mare, senor," said Sancho in reply to this,"for our horse is the most virtuous and well-behaved horse in the world;he never does anything wrong on such occasions, and the only time hemisbehaved, my master and I suffered for it sevenfold; I say again yourworship may pull up if you like; for if she was offered to him betweentwo plates the horse would not hanker after her."The traveller drew rein, amazed at the trim and features of Don Quixote,who rode without his helmet, which Sancho carried like a valise in frontof Dapple's pack-saddle; and if the man in green examined Don Quixoteclosely, still more closely did Don Quixote examine the man in green, whostruck him as being a man of intelligence. In appearance he was aboutfifty years of age, with but few grey hairs, an aquiline cast offeatures, and an expression between grave and gay; and his dress andaccoutrements showed him to be a man of good condition. What he in greenthought of Don Quixote of La Mancha was that a man of that sort and shapehe had never yet seen; he marvelled at the length of his hair, his loftystature, the lankness and sallowness of his countenance, his armour, hisbearing and his gravity--a figure and picture such as had not been seenin those regions for many a long day.Don Quixote saw very plainly the attention with which the traveller wasregarding him, and read his curiosity in his astonishment; and courteousas he was and ready to please everybody, before the other could ask himany question he anticipated him by saying, "The appearance I present toyour worship being so strange and so out of the common, I should not besurprised if it filled you with wonder; but you will cease to wonder whenI tell you, as I do, that I am one of those knights who, as people say,go seeking adventures. I have left my home, I have mortgaged my estate, Ihave given up my comforts, and committed myself to the arms of Fortune,to bear me whithersoever she may please. My desire was to bring to lifeagain knight-errantry, now dead, and for some time past, stumbling here,falling there, now coming down headlong, now raising myself up again, Ihave carried out a great portion of my design, succouring widows,protecting maidens, and giving aid to wives, orphans, and minors, theproper and natural duty of knights-errant; and, therefore, because of mymany valiant and Christian achievements, I have been already found worthyto make my way in print to well-nigh all, or most, of the nations of theearth. Thirty thousand volumes of my history have been printed, and it ison the high-road to be printed thirty thousand thousands of times, ifheaven does not put a stop to it. In short, to sum up all in a few words,or in a single one, I may tell you I am Don Quixote of La Mancha,otherwise called 'The Knight of the Rueful Countenance;' for thoughself-praise is degrading, I must perforce sound my own sometimes, that isto say, when there is no one at hand to do it for me. So that, gentlesir, neither this horse, nor this lance, nor this shield, nor thissquire, nor all these arms put together, nor the sallowness of mycountenance, nor my gaunt leanness, will henceforth astonish you, nowthat you know who I am and what profession I follow."With these words Don Quixote held his peace, and, from the time he tookto answer, the man in green seemed to be at a loss for a reply; after along pause, however, he said to him, "You were right when you sawcuriosity in my amazement, sir knight; but you have not succeeded inremoving the astonishment I feel at seeing you; for although you say,senor, that knowing who you are ought to remove it, it has not done so;on the contrary, now that I know, I am left more amazed and astonishedthan before. What! is it possible that there are knights-errant in theworld in these days, and histories of real chivalry printed? I cannotrealise the fact that there can be anyone on earth now-a-days who aidswidows, or protects maidens, or defends wives, or succours orphans; norshould I believe it had I not seen it in your worship with my own eyes.Blessed be heaven! for by means of this history of your noble and genuinechivalrous deeds, which you say has been printed, the countless storiesof fictitious knights-errant with which the world is filled, so much tothe injury of morality and the prejudice and discredit of good histories,will have been driven into oblivion.""There is a good deal to be said on that point," said Don Quixote, "as towhether the histories of the knights-errant are fiction or not.""Why, is there anyone who doubts that those histories are false?" saidthe man in green."I doubt it," said Don Quixote, "but never mind that just now; if ourjourney lasts long enough, I trust in God I shall show your worship thatyou do wrong in going with the stream of those who regard it as a matterof certainty that they are not true."From this last observation of Don Quixote's, the traveller began to havea suspicion that he was some crazy being, and was waiting him to confirmit by something further; but before they could turn to any new subjectDon Quixote begged him to tell him who he was, since he himself hadrendered account of his station and life. To this, he in the green gabanreplied "I, Sir Knight of the Rueful Countenance, am a gentleman bybirth, native of the village where, please God, we are going to dinetoday; I am more than fairly well off, and my name is Don Diego deMiranda. I pass my life with my wife, children, and friends; my pursuitsare hunting and fishing, but I keep neither hawks nor greyhounds, nothingbut a tame partridge or a bold ferret or two; I have six dozen or so ofbooks, some in our mother tongue, some Latin, some of them history,others devotional; those of chivalry have not as yet crossed thethreshold of my door; I am more given to turning over the profane thanthe devotional, so long as they are books of honest entertainment thatcharm by their style and attract and interest by the invention theydisplay, though of these there are very few in Spain. Sometimes I dinewith my neighbours and friends, and often invite them; my entertainmentsare neat and well served without stint of anything. I have no taste fortattle, nor do I allow tattling in my presence; I pry not into myneighbours' lives, nor have I lynx-eyes for what others do. I hear massevery day; I share my substance with the poor, making no display of goodworks, lest I let hypocrisy and vainglory, those enemies that subtly takepossession of the most watchful heart, find an entrance into mine. Istrive to make peace between those whom I know to be at variance; I amthe devoted servant of Our Lady, and my trust is ever in the infinitemercy of God our Lord."Sancho listened with the greatest attention to the account of thegentleman's life and occupation; and thinking it a good and a holy life,and that he who led it ought to work miracles, he threw himself offDapple, and running in haste seized his right stirrup and kissed his footagain and again with a devout heart and almost with tears.Seeing this the gentleman asked him, "What are you about, brother? Whatare these kisses for?""Let me kiss," said Sancho, "for I think your worship is the first saintin the saddle I ever saw all the days of my life.""I am no saint," replied the gentleman, "but a great sinner; but you are,brother, for you must be a good fellow, as your simplicity shows."Sancho went back and regained his pack-saddle, having extracted a laughfrom his master's profound melancholy, and excited fresh amazement in DonDiego. Don Quixote then asked him how many children he had, and observedthat one of the things wherein the ancient philosophers, who were withoutthe true knowledge of God, placed the summum bonum was in the gifts ofnature, in those of fortune, in having many friends, and many and goodchildren."I, Senor Don Quixote," answered the gentleman, "have one son, withoutwhom, perhaps, I should count myself happier than I am, not because he isa bad son, but because he is not so good as I could wish. He is eighteenyears of age; he has been for six at Salamanca studying Latin and Greek,and when I wished him to turn to the study of other sciences I found himso wrapped up in that of poetry (if that can be called a science) thatthere is no getting him to take kindly to the law, which I wished him tostudy, or to theology, the queen of them all. I would like him to be anhonour to his family, as we live in days when our kings liberally rewardlearning that is virtuous and worthy; for learning without virtue is apearl on a dunghill. He spends the whole day in settling whether Homerexpressed himself correctly or not in such and such a line of the Iliad,whether Martial was indecent or not in such and such an epigram, whethersuch and such lines of Virgil are to be understood in this way or inthat; in short, all his talk is of the works of these poets, and those ofHorace, Perseus, Juvenal, and Tibullus; for of the moderns in our ownlanguage he makes no great account; but with all his seeming indifferenceto Spanish poetry, just now his thoughts are absorbed in making a glosson four lines that have been sent him from Salamanca, which I suspect arefor some poetical tournament."To all this Don Quixote said in reply, "Children, senor, are portions oftheir parents' bowels, and therefore, be they good or bad, are to beloved as we love the souls that give us life; it is for the parents toguide them from infancy in the ways of virtue, propriety, and worthyChristian conduct, so that when grown up they may be the staff of theirparents' old age, and the glory of their posterity; and to force them tostudy this or that science I do not think wise, though it may be no harmto persuade them; and when there is no need to study for the sake of panelucrando, and it is the student's good fortune that heaven has given himparents who provide him with it, it would be my advice to them to let himpursue whatever science they may see him most inclined to; and thoughthat of poetry is less useful than pleasurable, it is not one of thosethat bring discredit upon the possessor. Poetry, gentle sir, is, as Itake it, like a tender young maiden of supreme beauty, to array, bedeck,and adorn whom is the task of several other maidens, who are all the restof the sciences; and she must avail herself of the help of all, and allderive their lustre from her. But this maiden will not bear to behandled, nor dragged through the streets, nor exposed either at thecorners of the market-places, or in the closets of palaces. She is theproduct of an Alchemy of such virtue that he who is able to practise it,will turn her into pure gold of inestimable worth. He that possesses hermust keep her within bounds, not permitting her to break out in ribaldsatires or soulless sonnets. She must on no account be offered for sale,unless, indeed, it be in heroic poems, moving tragedies, or sprightly andingenious comedies. She must not be touched by the buffoons, nor by theignorant vulgar, incapable of comprehending or appreciating her hiddentreasures. And do not suppose, senor, that I apply the term vulgar heremerely to plebeians and the lower orders; for everyone who is ignorant,be he lord or prince, may and should be included among the vulgar. He,then, who shall embrace and cultivate poetry under the conditions I havenamed, shall become famous, and his name honoured throughout all thecivilised nations of the earth. And with regard to what you say, senor,of your son having no great opinion of Spanish poetry, I am inclined tothink that he is not quite right there, and for this reason: the greatpoet Homer did not write in Latin, because he was a Greek, nor did Virgilwrite in Greek, because he was a Latin; in short, all the ancient poetswrote in the language they imbibed with their mother's milk, and neverwent in quest of foreign ones to express their sublime conceptions; andthat being so, the usage should in justice extend to all nations, and theGerman poet should not be undervalued because he writes in his ownlanguage, nor the Castilian, nor even the Biscayan, for writing in his.But your son, senor, I suspect, is not prejudiced against Spanish poetry,but against those poets who are mere Spanish verse writers, without anyknowledge of other languages or sciences to adorn and give life andvigour to their natural inspiration; and yet even in this he may bewrong; for, according to a true belief, a poet is born one; that is tosay, the poet by nature comes forth a poet from his mother's womb; andfollowing the bent that heaven has bestowed upon him, without the aid ofstudy or art, he produces things that show how truly he spoke who said,'Est Deus in nobis,' etc. At the same time, I say that the poet by naturewho calls in art to his aid will be a far better poet, and will surpasshim who tries to be one relying upon his knowledge of art alone. Thereason is, that art does not surpass nature, but only brings it toperfection; and thus, nature combined with art, and art with nature, willproduce a perfect poet. To bring my argument to a close, I would saythen, gentle sir, let your son go on as his star leads him, for being sostudious as he seems to be, and having already successfully surmountedthe first step of the sciences, which is that of the languages, withtheir help he will by his own exertions reach the summit of politeliterature, which so well becomes an independent gentleman, and adorns,honours, and distinguishes him, as much as the mitre does the bishop, orthe gown the learned counsellor. If your son write satires reflecting onthe honour of others, chide and correct him, and tear them up; but if hecompose discourses in which he rebukes vice in general, in the style ofHorace, and with elegance like his, commend him; for it is legitimate fora poet to write against envy and lash the envious in his verse, and theother vices too, provided he does not single out individuals; there are,however, poets who, for the sake of saying something spiteful, would runthe risk of being banished to the coast of Pontus. If the poet be pure inhis morals, he will be pure in his verses too; the pen is the tongue ofthe mind, and as the thought engendered there, so will be the things thatit writes down. And when kings and princes observe this marvellousscience of poetry in wise, virtuous, and thoughtful subjects, theyhonour, value, exalt them, and even crown them with the leaves of thattree which the thunderbolt strikes not, as if to show that they whosebrows are honoured and adorned with such a crown are not to be assailedby anyone."He of the green gaban was filled with astonishment at Don Quixote'sargument, so much so that he began to abandon the notion he had taken upabout his being crazy. But in the middle of the discourse, it being notvery much to his taste, Sancho had turned aside out of the road to beg alittle milk from some shepherds, who were milking their ewes hard by; andjust as the gentleman, highly pleased, was about to renew theconversation, Don Quixote, raising his head, perceived a cart coveredwith royal flags coming along the road they were travelling; andpersuaded that this must be some new adventure, he called aloud to Sanchoto come and bring him his helmet. Sancho, hearing himself called, quittedthe shepherds, and, prodding Dapple vigorously, came up to his master, towhom there fell a terrific and desperate adventure.