|
The Fourth BookChapter XXII.
Chapter XXII.
Wherein the Discreet Discourse That Passed Between Sancho Panza and His Lord
Don Quixote Is Expressed
`Ha,` quoth Sancho, `have I caught you at last? This is that which I
desired to know, as much as my soul or life. Come now, sir, and tell me, can
you deny that which is wont to be said, when a body is ill - disposed, "I know
not what ails such a one; for he neither eats nor drinks nor sleeps, nor
answers directly to that which is demanded him, so as it seems that he is
enchanted"? By which may be collected, that such as neither eat, drink, sleep,
nor do the other natural things you wot of, are enchanted; but not those which
have a desire as you have, and eat meat when they get it, and drink drink when
it is given them, and answer to all that is propounded unto them.` `Thou sayst
true, Sancho,` quoth Don Quixote; `but I have told thee already that there are
divers sorts of enchantments, and perhaps they change with the times from one
kind into another, and that now the enchanted use to do all that which I do,
although they did not so in times past; and therefore there is no disputing or
drawing of conclusions against the customs of the time. I know, and do verily
persuade myself, that I am enchanted, and that is sufficient for the discharge
of my conscience, which would be greatly burdened if I thought that I were not
enchanted, and yet permitted myself to be borne away in this cage idly, and
like a coward withholding the succour I might give to many distressed and
needy persons, which even at this hour be like enough to have extreme want of
mine aid and assistance.` `Yet say I, notwithstanding,` replied Sancho, `that
for more abundant satisfaction, your worship might do well to attempt the
getting out of this prison, the which I do oblige myself with all my power to
facilitate, yea, and to get out, and then you may recount eftsoons on the good
Rozinante, who also seems enchanted, so sad and melancholy he goes. And this
being done, we may again essay the fortune of seeking adventures, which, if it
have no good success, we have time enough to return to our cage; wherein I
promise, by the faith of a good and loyal squire, to shut up myself together
with you, if you shall prove so unfortunate, or I so foolish, as not to bring
our designs to a good issue.` `I am content to do what thou sayst, brother
Sancho,` replied Don Quixote; `and when thou seest opportunity offered to free
me, I will be ruled by thee in everything; but yet thou shalt see how far thou
art over - wrought in the knowledge thou wilt seem to have of my disgrace.`
The knight - errant and the ill - errant squire beguiled the time in
those discourses, until they arrived to the place where the canon, curate, and
barber expected them. And then, Sancho alighting, and helping to take down the
cage, the wainman unyoked his oxen, permitting them to take the benefit of
pasture in that green and pleasant valley, whose verdure invited not such to
enjoy it as were enchanted like Don Quixote, but rather such heedful and
discreet persons as was his man, who entreated the curate to license his lord
to come out but a little while, for otherwise the prison would not be so
cleanly as the presence of so worthy a knight as his lord was required. The
curate understood his meaning, and answered that he would satisfy his requests
very willingly, but that he feared when he saw himself at liberty, he would
play them some prank or other, and go whither nobody should ever set eye on
him after. `I will be his surety that he shall not fly away,` quoth Sancho.
`And I also, quoth the canon, `if he will but promise me, as he is a knight,
that he will not depart from us without our consent.` `I give my word that I
will not,` quoth Don Quixote, who heard all that they had said, `and the
rather because that enchanted bodies have not free will to dispose of
themselves as they list; for he that enchanted them may make them unable to
stir from one place in three days; and if they make an escape, he can compel
them to return flying; and therefore, since it was so, they might securely set
him at liberty, especially seeing it would redound so much to all their
benefits; for if they did not free him, or get farther off, he protested that
he could not forbear to offend their noses.` The canon took his hand (although
it were bound), and [Don Quixote promised by] his faith and word that he would
not depart, and then they gave him liberty; whereat he infinitely rejoiced,
especially seeing himself out of the cage. The first thing that he did after
was to stretch all his body, and then he went towards Rozinante, and, striking
him twice or thrice on the buttocks, he said, `I hope yet in God and His
blessed mother, O flower and mirror of horses! that we two shall see ourselves
very soon in that state which our hearts desire; thou with thy lord on thy
back, and I mounted on thee, and exercising the function for which God sent me
into this world.` And, saying so, Don Quixote with his squire Sancho retired
himself somewhat from the company, and came back soon after a little more
lightened, but greatly desiring to execute his squire`s designs.
The canon beheld him very earnestly, and with admiration, wondering to
see the strangeness of his fond humour, and how that he showed, in whatsoever
he uttered, a very good understanding, and only left the stirrups (as is said
before) when any mention was made of chivalry; and therefore, moved to
compassion, after they were all laid down along upon the grass, expecting
their dinner, he said unto him, `Gentleman, is it possible that the idle and
unsavoury lecture of books of knighthood hath so much distracted your wit as
thus to believe that you are carried away enchanted, with other things of that
kind, as much wide from truth as untruths can be from verity itself? Or how is
it possible that any human understanding can frame itself to believe that in
this world there have been such an infinity of Amadises, such a crew of famous
knights, so many emperors of Trapisonda, such a number of Felixmartes of
Hircania; so many palfreys, damsels - errant, serpents, robbers, giants,
battles, unheard - of adventures, sundry kinds of enchantments, such
immeasureable encounters, such bravery of apparel, such a multitude of
enamoured and valiant princesses, so many squires, earls, witty dwarfs,
viragoes, love - letters, amorous dalliances; and finally, so many, so
unreasonable and impossible adventures as are contained in the books of
knighthood?
`Thus much I dare avouch of myself, that when I read them, as long as I
do not think that they are all but toys and untruths, they delight me; but
when I ponder seriously what they are, I throw the very best of them against
the walls, yea, and would throw them into the fire if they were near me, or in
my hands, having well deserved that severity, as false impostors and seducers
of common sense, as broachers of new sects and of uncouth courses of life, as
those that give occasion to the ignorant vulgar to believe in such exorbitant
untruths as are contained in them; yea, and are withal so presumptuous, as to
dare to confound the wits of the most discreet and best descended gentlemen;
as we may clearly perceive by that they have done to yourself, whom they have
brought to such terms as it is necessary to shut you up in a cage and carry
you on a team of oxen, even as one carries a lion or tiger from place to
place, to gain a living by the showing of him. Therefore, good Sir Don
Quixote, take compassion of yourself, and return into the bosom of discretion,
and learn to employ the most happy talent of understanding and abundance of
wit, wherewith bountiful Heaven hath enriched you, to some other course of
study, which may redound to the profit of your soul; and advancement of your
credit and estate. And if, borne away by your natural disposition, you will
yet persist in the reading of warlike and knightly discourses, read in the
Holy Scripture the Acts of Judges, for there you shall find surpassing feats
and deeds, as true as valorous. Portugal had a Viriathus; Rome a Caesar;
Carthage a Hannibal; Greece an Alexander; Castile an Earl Fernan Gonzalez;
Valencia a Cid; Andalusia a Gonzalo Hernandez; Estremadura a Diego Garcia de
Paredes; Xerez a Garcia Perez de Vargas; Toledo a Garcilaso de la Vega;
Seville a Don Manuel de Leon: the discourses of whose valorous acts may
entertain, teach, delight, and make to wonder the most sublime wit that shall
read them. Yea, this were indeed a study fit for your sharp understanding, my
dear Sir Don Quixote, for by this you should become learned in histories,
enamoured of virtue, instructed in goodness, bettered in manners, valiant
without rashness, bold without cowardice; and all this to God`s honour, your
own profit, and renown of the Mancha, from whence, as I have learned, you
deduce your beginning and progeny.`
Don Quixote listened with all attention unto the canon`s admonition, and
perceiving that he was come to an end of them, after he had looked upon him a
good while he said, `Methinks, gentleman, that the scope of your discourse
hath been addressed to persuade me that there never were any knights - errant
in the world, and that all the books of chivalry are false, lying, hurtful,
and unprofitable to the commonwealth, and that I have done ill to read them,
worse to believe in them, and worst of all to follow them, by having thus
taken on me the most austere profession of wandering knighthood, whereof they
entreat; denying, moreover, that there were ever any Amadises, either of Gaul
or Greece; or any of all the other knights wherewith such books are stuffed.`
`All is just as you have said,` quoth the canon: whereto Don Quixote
replied thus, `You also added, that such books had done me much hurt, seeing
they had turned my judgment, and immured me up in this cage, and that it were
better for me to make some amendment, and alter my study, reading other that
are more authentic, and delight and instruct much better.`
`It is very true,` answered the canon.
`Why, then,` quoth Don Quixote, `I find, by mine accounts, that the
enchanted and senseless man is yourself, seeing you have bent yourself to
speak so many blasphemies against a thing so true, so current, and of such
request in the world, as he that should deny it, as you do, merits the same
punishment which as you say you give to those books when the reading thereof
offends you; for to go about to make men believe that Amadis never lived, nor
any other of those knights wherewith histories are fully replenished, would be
none other than to persuade them that the sun lightens not, the earth sustains
not, nor the ice makes anything cold. See what wit is there in the world so
profound, that can induce another to believe that the history of Guy of
Burgundy and the Princes Floripes was not true? Nor that of Fierabras, with
the Bridge of Mantible, which befel in Charlemagne`s time, and is, I swear, as
true as that it is day at this instant? And if it be a lie, so must it be also
that ever there was an Hector, Achilles, or the war of Troy; the Twelve Peers
of France; or King Arthur of Britain, who goes yet about the world in the
shape of a crow, and is every foot expected in his kingdom. And they will as
well presume to say that the History of Guarino Mezquino and of the quest of
the Holy San Greal be lies; and that for the love between Sir Tristram and La
Bella Ysoude, and between Queen Guenevor and Sir Lancelor Dulake, we have no
sufficient authority; and yet there be certain persons alive which almost
remember that they have seen the Lady Queintanonina, who was one of the best
skinkers of wine that ever Great Britain had; and this is so certain, as I
remember that one of my grandmothers of my father`s side was wont to say unto
me, when she saw my matron, with a long and reverend kerchief or veil, "My
boy, that woman resembles very much Lady Queintanonina." From which I argue,
that either she knew her herself, or at the least had seen some portraiture of
hers. Who can, moreover, deny the certainty of the history of Peter of
Provence and the beautiful Magalona, seeing that, until this very day, one may
behold, in the king`s armoury, the pin wherewith he guided and turned anyway
he listed the horse of wood whereupon he rode through the air, which pin is a
little bigger than the thill of a cart; and near unto it is also seen Babieca
his saddle; and in Roncesvalles there yet hangs Orlando`s horn, which is as
big as a very great joist, whence is inferred that there were Twelve Peers,
that there was a Pierres of Provence, that also there were Cids, and other
such knights as those which the world terms adventurers. If not, let them also
tell me, that the valiant Lusitanian, John de Melo, was no knight - errant,
who went to Burgundy, and in the city of Ras fought with the famous lord of
Charni, called Mosen Pierres, and after with Mosen Henry of Ramestan, in the
city of Basilea, and bore away the victory in both the conflicts, to his
eternal fame; and that there was no such curres as the adventures and single
combats begun and ended in Burgundy by the valiant Spaniards, Pedro Garba and
Guttierre Quixada (from whom I myself am lineally descended), who overcame the
Earl of Saint Paul`s sons. They may also aver unto me that Don Fernando de
Guevarra went not to seek adventures in Germany, where he fought with Micer
George, a knight of the Duke of Austria his house. Let them likewise affirm
that Suero de Quinonnes of the Pass his jousts were but jests; as also the
enterprise of Mosen Louis de Falses against Don Gonzalo de Guzman, a gentleman
of Castile, with many other renowned acts, done as well by Christian knights
of this kingdom as of other foreign lands, which are all so authentic and
true, as that I am compelled to reiterate what I said before, which is, that
whosoever denies them is defective of reason and good discourse.`
Full of admiration remained the good canon to hear the composition and
medley that Don Quixote made of truths and fictions together, and at the great
notice he had of all things that might anyway concern his knighthood - errant;
and therefore he shaped him this answer: `I cannot deny, Sir Don Quixote, but
that some part of that which you have said is true, especially touching those
Spanish adventurers of whom you have spoken, and will likewise grant you that
there were Twelve Peers of France, but I will not believe that they have
accomplished all that which the Archbishop Turpin hath left written of them;
for the bare truth of the affair is, that they were certain noblemen chosen
out by the kings of France, whom they called peers, because they were all
equal in valour, quality, and worth; or if they were not, it was at least
presumed that they were; and they were not much unlike the military orders of
Saint James or Calatrava, were in request, wherein is presupposed that such as
are of the profession are, or ought to be, valourous and well - descended
gentlemen: and as now they say a knight of Saint John or Alcantara, so in
those times they said a knight of the Twelve Peers, because they were twelve
equals, chosen to be of that military order. That there was a Cid and a
Bernard of Carpio is also doubtless; that they have done the acts recounted of
them I believe there is very great cause to doubt. As touching the pin of the
good Earl Pierres, and that it is by Babieca his saddle in the king`s armoury,
I confess that my sin hath made me so ignorant, or blind, that although I have
viewed the saddle very well, yet could I never get a sight of that pin, how
great soever you affirm it to be.`
`Well, it is there without question,` quoth Don Quixote; `and for the
greater confirmation thereof, they say it is laid up in a case of neat`s
leather to keep it from rusting.` `That may very well so be,` said the canon;
`yet by the orders that I have received, I do not remember that ever I saw it:
and although I should grant it to be there, yet do I not therefore oblige
myself to believe the histories of all the Amadises, nor those of the other
rabblement of knights which books do mention unto us; nor is it reason that so
honourable a man, adorned with so many good parts and endowed with such a wit
as you are, should believe that so many and so strange follies as are written
in the raving books of chivalry can be true.`
|
