Such was the soliloquy Sancho held with himself, and all the conclusion

he could come to was to say to himself again, "Well, there's remedy for

everything except death, under whose yoke we have all to pass, whether we

like it or not, when life's finished. I have seen by a thousand signs

that this master of mine is a madman fit to be tied, and for that matter,

I too, am not behind him; for I'm a greater fool than he is when I follow

him and serve him, if there's any truth in the proverb that says, 'Tell

me what company thou keepest, and I'll tell thee what thou art,' or in

that other, 'Not with whom thou art bred, but with whom thou art fed.'

Well then, if he be mad, as he is, and with a madness that mostly takes

one thing for another, and white for black, and black for white, as was

seen when he said the windmills were giants, and the monks' mules

dromedaries, flocks of sheep armies of enemies, and much more to the same

tune, it will not be very hard to make him believe that some country

girl, the first I come across here, is the lady Dulcinea; and if he does

not believe it, I'll swear it; and if he should swear, I'll swear again;

and if he persists I'll persist still more, so as, come what may, to have

my quoit always over the peg. Maybe, by holding out in this way, I may

put a stop to his sending me on messages of this kind another time; or

maybe he will think, as I suspect he will, that one of those wicked

enchanters, who he says have a spite against him, has changed her form

for the sake of doing him an ill turn and injuring him."

With this reflection Sancho made his mind easy, counting the business as

good as settled, and stayed there till the afternoon so as to make Don

Quixote think he had time enough to go to El Toboso and return; and

things turned out so luckily for him that as he got up to mount Dapple,

he spied, coming from El Toboso towards the spot where he stood, three

peasant girls on three colts, or fillies--for the author does not make

the point clear, though it is more likely they were she-asses, the usual

mount with village girls; but as it is of no great consequence, we need

not stop to prove it.

To be brief, the instant Sancho saw the peasant girls, he returned full

speed to seek his master, and found him sighing and uttering a thousand

passionate lamentations. When Don Quixote saw him he exclaimed, "What

news, Sancho, my friend? Am I to mark this day with a white stone or a

black?"




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