WHEREIN IS RELATED THE CRAFTY DEVICE SANCHO ADOPTED TO ENCHANT THE LADY

DULCINEA, AND OTHER INCIDENTS AS LUDICROUS AS THEY ARE TRUE

When the author of this great history comes to relate what is set down in

this chapter he says he would have preferred to pass it over in silence,

fearing it would not be believed, because here Don Quixote's madness

reaches the confines of the greatest that can be conceived, and even goes

a couple of bowshots beyond the greatest. But after all, though still

under the same fear and apprehension, he has recorded it without adding

to the story or leaving out a particle of the truth, and entirely

disregarding the charges of falsehood that might be brought against him;

and he was right, for the truth may run fine but will not break, and

always rises above falsehood as oil above water; and so, going on with

his story, he says that as soon as Don Quixote had ensconced himself in

the forest, oak grove, or wood near El Toboso, he bade Sancho return to

the city, and not come into his presence again without having first

spoken on his behalf to his lady, and begged of her that it might be her

good pleasure to permit herself to be seen by her enslaved knight, and

deign to bestow her blessing upon him, so that he might thereby hope for

a happy issue in all his encounters and difficult enterprises. Sancho

undertook to execute the task according to the instructions, and to bring

back an answer as good as the one he brought back before.

"Go, my son," said Don Quixote, "and be not dazed when thou findest

thyself exposed to the light of that sun of beauty thou art going to

seek. Happy thou, above all the squires in the world! Bear in mind, and

let it not escape thy memory, how she receives thee; if she changes

colour while thou art giving her my message; if she is agitated and

disturbed at hearing my name; if she cannot rest upon her cushion,

shouldst thou haply find her seated in the sumptuous state chamber proper

to her rank; and should she be standing, observe if she poises herself

now on one foot, now on the other; if she repeats two or three times the

reply she gives thee; if she passes from gentleness to austerity, from

asperity to tenderness; if she raises her hand to smooth her hair though

it be not disarranged. In short, my son, observe all her actions and

motions, for if thou wilt report them to me as they were, I will gather

what she hides in the recesses of her heart as regards my love; for I

would have thee know, Sancho, if thou knowest it not, that with lovers

the outward actions and motions they give way to when their loves are in

question are the faithful messengers that carry the news of what is going

on in the depths of their hearts. Go, my friend, may better fortune than

mine attend thee, and bring thee a happier issue than that which I await

in dread in this dreary solitude."




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