SANCHO WAS extremely happy seeing himself seemingly in the duchess’s favor, because it appeared to him that he would find in her castle what he’d found in the houses of don Diego and Basilio, ever a friend of the good life, and so he took Opportunity by the forelock whenever good hospitality was offered.
The history relates, then, that before they arrived at the country house or castle, the duke went on ahead and told all his servants how they were to treat don Quixote, who, as soon as he arrived with the duchess to the portals of the castle, two grooms or stableboys, dressed from head to foot in what they call house robes, made of exquisite crimson satin, went over and took don Quixote’s arm, and quietly said to him: “Your greatness, go over and help my lady the duchess dismount.”
Don Quixote went over, and there was a long exchange of polite remarks between them about what should be done, but the duchess prevailed, and refused to get off her palfrey, except in the arms of the duke, saying that such a useless weight was not worthy of such a great knight. The duke then came over to help her down, and when they went into a large patio, two beautiful maidens came and placed a cloak of very fine scarlet cloth over don Quixote’s shoulders, and instantly the galleries of the patio were crowded with servants of the duke and duchess, both male and female, shouting: “Hail to the flower and cream of knights errant!”
And almost everyone began sprinkling sweet smelling water from vials onto don Quixote and the duke and duchess, which amazed don Quixote. That was the first day that he thought and believed himself to be a true knight errant and not a make-believe one, seeing himself being treated in the same way he’d read that knights errant were treated in earlier ages.
Sancho, having left his donkey outside, had latched onto the duchess and went into the castle, but since his conscience caused him some remorse because he’d left the donkey all alone, he approached a reverent duenna, and said to her very quietly: “Señora González, or whatever your grace’s name is…”
“Doña Rodríguez de Grijalba is my name,” responded the duenna, “what do you want, brother?”
To which Sancho responded: “I would like your grace to do me the favor of going out of the gates of the castle where you’ll find a grey donkey of mine. Would your grace please have him put, or put him yourself, in the stable, because the poor thing is a bit timid, and he can’t stand being left alone.”
“If the master is as sharp as the servant,” responded the duenna, “we’re in trouble. You go yourself, brother, and bad luck not only to you but also to the man who brought you here—take care of your donkey yourself, because duennas in this house don’t do those things.”
“In truth,” responded Sancho, “I’ve heard my master, who is quite knowledgeable about history, tell about Lancelot:
and as for my donkey, I wouldn’t trade him even for señor Lancelot’s horse.”
“Brother, if you’re a troubadour,” replied the duenna, “keep your songs for when they’re appropriate and you’ll get paid for them, because from me you’ll only get a fig.”
“It would be a ripe one,” responded Sancho, “and where years count, you won’t lose the game by a point too few.”
“Whoreson!” said the duenna, burning with rage, “If I’m old or not, I’ll give an accounting only to God, and not to you, you garlic-stuffed knave.”
And she shouted this so loudly that the duchess heard her, and turning around to see the duenna so worked up and with her eyes flashing, asked why she was quarreling.
“I’m quarreling,” responded the duenna, “with this good fellow who has so courteously asked me to put a donkey of his at the gate of the castle into the stable, giving as an example some ladies from I-don’t-know-where took care of a certain Lancelot, and duennas looked after his horse—and he wound up by calling me old.”
“I’d be more insulted by that,” said the duchess, “than anything else that could be said to me.”
And turning to Sancho she said: “You should be aware, Sancho my friend, that doña Rodríguez is quite young, and she wears that hood more to show her position, and more because it’s a custom, than because of her age.”
“May the remaining years of my life be bad,” responded Sancho, “if I meant it as an insult. I only said it because of the great affection I have for my donkey, and it seemed to me that I could do no better than to put him in the charge of a person as charitable as doña Rodríguez.”
Don Quixote heard everything and said to him: “Is this type of conversation appropriate for a place such as this?”
“Señor,” responded Sancho, “everybody has to talk of his needs wherever he happens to be. I remembered the donkey right here, and right here I spoke about him. If I had remembered in the stable, I would have spoken about him there.”
To which the duke answered: “Sancho is very right and we can’t fault him for anything. We’ll give the donkey all the feed he wants, and Sancho need not worry, for we’ll treat the donkey as well as we’ll treat him.”
With these words, savored by all except don Quixote, they arrived at the top of the stairs, and escorted don Quixote into a room lined with rich brocaded material with gold strands. Six maidens removed his armor and served him as pages, all of them instructed and forewarned by the duke and duchess about what they had to do and how they were to treat don Quixote, so he might think and see they were treating him like a knight errant. After they had removed his armor, don Quixote was dressed in his tight breeches and chamois doublet; withered, lank, and long, with cheeks that kissed each other on the inside, a figure at which—if the maidens hadn’t known they should restrain their laughter (which was one of the strict orders their masters had given them), they would have burst out laughing.
They asked him if he would let them undress him so he could put on a shirt, but he wouldn’t consent, saying that modesty became knights errant as much as courage.
So, he asked them to give the shirt to Sancho, and shutting himself up in a room where there was a richly decorated bed, he stripped and put on the shirt, and seeing himself alone with Sancho, said to him: “Tell me, you modern scoundrel and old-fashioned blockhead, did it seem like a good thing to you to offend such a venerable duenna so worthy of respect as that one is? Was it the right moment to remember your donkey? Or are these people who will let an animal be mistreated when they entertain their owners so elegantly? In the name of God, Sancho, restrain yourself, and don’t show your true character so they’ll see that you’re woven of coarse country stuff. Look, you sinner, a master is held in greater respect the more he has honored and well-mannered servants, and one of the advantages that princes have over other men is that they have servants who are as good as they are. Don’t you know—you who are as wretched as I am unfortunate—if they see that you’re a coarse bumpkin or an amusing idiot, they’ll think that I’m some charlatan or some fraudulent knight? No, no, Sancho, my friend. Flee, flee from these obstacles, for once you stumble into being a chatterbox and a jester, when you trip the first time, you’ll turn into a most unfortunate buffoon. Bridle your tongue, and consider and meditate on each word that leaves your mouth, and be aware that we’re now in a place where, with the help of God and by the strength of my arm, we will leave greatly enriched in fame and fortune.”
Sancho promised him most earnestly that he would stitch his mouth closed or bite his tongue before he’d say a word that wasn’t pertinent and well thought-out, as he was commanded, and that don Quixote shouldn’t worry about it any further. Through his behavior it would never be known who they were.
Don Quixote got dressed and put on his sword, threw the scarlet cloak on his back and put a cap of green satin—which the maidens had given him—on his head, and in this outfit he went into the great hall, where he found the maidens arranged in two equal outstretched lines, all with vessels with which to wash his hands, which they did with proper respect and ceremony. Then came twelve pages with the steward, to escort him to dine, for his hosts were waiting for him. They put him in the middle, and with full pomp and majesty took him into the next room where there was a rich table set only for four. The duchess and duke went to the door to receive him, and with them there was a solemn ecclesiastic of the kind that rules the houses of princes—of those who, since they weren’t born princes, don’t succeed in instructing those who are how to behave; of those who want the greatness of the great to be measured against the pettiness of their spirits; of those who, trying to teach those they govern how to be thrifty, succeed only in making them miserable; of those, I say, that the solemn ecclesiastic who went with the duke and duchess to receive don Quixote must have been. They said a thousand courteous things and finally, surrounding don Quixote, they went in to sit at the table.
The duke invited don Quixote to sit at the head of the table, and although he refused, the insistent requests by the duke were so many that he finally sat there. The ecclesiastic sat opposite him, and the duke and duchess were at either side. Sancho witnessed all this and was amazed and dumbfounded seeing the honor those noble people had shown his master and noting the great respect shown and entreaties that passed between the duke and don Quixote to invite him to sit at the head of the table, said: “If your graces will allow me, I’ll tell a little story about something that happened in my village, about the matter of seating.”
Scarcely had Sancho said this when don Quixote began to tremble, believing without any doubt, that he was about to say something foolish. Sancho looked at him and understood what he was thinking, and said: “Don’t worry, your grace, señor mío, that I’ll behave poorly or that I’ll say something that isn’t pertinent. I haven’t forgotten the advice your grace gave me a little while ago about speaking a lot or a little, or well or badly.”
“I don’t remember anything of the kind, Sancho,” responded don Quixote. “Say whatever you want, as long as you don’t take too long.”
“Well, what I have to say,” said Sancho, “is so true that my master don Quixote, who is present, won’t let me lie.”
“As far as I’m concerned,” replied don Quixote, “you can lie, Sancho, as much as you want and I won’t stop you. But be careful in what you say.”
“I’ll be really careful, and «he who sounds the alarm is safe», as you’ll soon see.”
“It’d be a good idea,” said don Quixote, “for your highnesses to have this idiot ejected from here because he’s going to say a thousand stupid things.”
“On the life of the duke,” said the duchess, “Sancho won’t leave my side one single bit. I like him very much because I know he’s wise.”
“May your holiness live wise days,” said Sancho, “for the confidence you have in me, even though I don’t deserve it. And the story that I want to tell you goes like this: an hidalgo in my town, and he was very rich and from the upper class since he came from the Álamos of Medina del Campo, who married doña Mancía de Quiñones, the daughter of Alonso de Marañón, a knight of the Order of Santiago who drowned in the battle of Herradura, about whom there was that dispute in our town years ago, which, I understand, my master don Quixote had something to do with, and from which that mischievous Tomasillo, the son of Balbastro the blacksmith, wound up wounded… Isn’t all of this true, señor master? Say it’s so, as you live, so that these people won’t take me for a talkative liar.”
“Up to now,” said the ecclesiastic, “I think you’re more talkative than a liar, but from now on I don’t know what I’ll think of you.”
“You’ve cited so many witnesses, Sancho, and given so much proof, that I have to agree you must be telling the truth. Go on, and shorten your story, because you’re carrying on so much, you won’t finish in two days.”
“He is not to shorten it,” said the duchess, “to please me. Rather he should tell it the way he knows it even though it takes him six days to finish. If it takes that long, those will be the best days of my life.”
“So, I say, señores míos,” Sancho went on, “that this hidalgo, who I know like the back of my hand, because his house isn’t a bowshot from mine, invited a poor but honorable peasant…”
“Move along, brother,” said the religious man at that point, “because the way you’re going, you won’t finish until we get to the other world.”
“I’ll stop less than half way there, if it pleases God,” responded Sancho, “and, I say, when the peasant got to the house of the hidalgo I mentioned who invited him, and may his soul rest in peace because he’s dead now, and the way they tell it, he had the death of an angel. I wasn’t there since I had to do some harvesting at Tembleque…”
“For the love of Mike, son, come back soon from Tembleque, and without burying the hidalgo, if you don’t want to bore us to death, and finish your story.”
“So, what happened,” replied Sancho, “is that just as the two of them were getting ready to sit down—and it’s as if I can see them now…”
The duke and duchess were really amused at the religious man’s vexation over the length of and pauses in Sancho’s story, and don Quixote was quite consumed with anger and rage.
“So, as I was saying,” said Sancho, “when the two of them were about to sit down, the peasant begged the hidalgo to sit at the head of the table and the hidalgo begged the peasant to sit at the head of the table, because in his house you were supposed to do what he asked. But the peasant, who considered himself very courteous and well-bred, refused until the hidalgo, who was quite annoyed, putting his hands on the other’s shoulders, forced him to sit, saying: ‘Sit down, you stupid bore, for wherever I sit, it will be the head of the table.’ And that’s the story, and in truth I think that it’s quite pertinent.”
Don Quixote turned a thousand colors, and on his tanned skin one could see a marbled effect. The duke and duchess concealed their laughter so that don Quixote wouldn’t be totally abashed, since they understood Sancho’s mischievousness; so to change the subject and prevent Sancho from continuing his foolishness, the duchess asked don Quixote what news he had of señora Dulcinea, and if he’d sent her presents of giants or brigands in recent days, since he must have conquered many of them.
To which don Quixote responded: “Señora mía, my misfortunes, although they had a beginning, will never have an end. I’ve vanquished giants and I’ve sent her rogues and brigands. But where will they find her since she has been enchanted and turned into the ugliest peasant girl you can imagine?”
“I don’t know,” said Sancho, “because to me she appeared to be the most beautiful creature in the world. At least, in her lightness of foot and in frisking about, a tumbler couldn’t surpass her. I swear, señora duchess, she jumps onto a she-ass as if she were a cat.”
“And have you seen her in her enchanted form, Sancho?” asked the duke.
“What do you mean ‘have I seen her?’ ” responded Sancho, “Who the devil was it, if not me, who first thought of this enchantment business? She’s as enchanted as my father is.”
The ecclesiastic who heard all this about giants, rogues, and enchantments, realized that this must be don Quixote de La Mancha, from whose history the duke frequently read, and he’d reprehended him many times for it, saying that it was foolish to read such nonsense. When he was sure that what he suspected was true, he spoke to the duke and with great anger said: “Your excellency, señor mío, will have to account to our Lord about what this good fellow is doing. This don Quixote, or don Stupid, or whatever he’s called, I imagine must not be as idiotic as your excellency thinks, since you’re encouraging him to carry out his follies and nonsense.” And turning his attention to don Quixote, he said: “And you, you numbskull, who put it in your brain that you’re a knight errant and that you conquer giants and take on brigands? Be on your way, and let me tell you: go home and raise your children if you have any, and take care of your estate, and stop wandering through the world wasting time and being the laughingstock of all those who meet you and even those who don’t. Where in heaven’s name have you heard that there were or are now knights errant? Where are there giants in Spain or brigands in La Mancha, or enchanted Dulcineas, or anything else from the pack of nonsense that they report about you?”
Don Quixote was quite attentive to the words of that venerable man, and seeing that he was now silent, without respecting the presence of the duke and duchess, with a furious expression of indignation on his face, he stood up and said… But his answer deserves a chapter to itself.