Miguel Cervantes

THE HISTORY OF DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA
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CHAPTER XXXVII.

The pleasant discourse between Don Quixote, Sancho Panza, and the bachelor Samson Carrasco.

Don Quixote could not be persuaded that there was a history [Pg 182] of himself extant, while yet the blood of those enemies he had cut off had scarce done reeking on the blade of his sword; so that they could not have already finished and printed the history of his mighty feats of arms. However, at last he concluded that some learned sage had, by the way of enchantment, been able to commit them to the press, either as a friend, to extol his heroic achievements above the noblest performances of the most famous knights-errant; or as an enemy, to sully the lustre of his exploits, and debase them below the most inferior actions of any of the meanest squires. Though, thought he to himself, the actions of squires were never yet recorded; and after all, if there were such a book printed, since it was the history of a knight-errant, it could not choose but be pompous, lofty, magnificent, and authentic. This thought yielded him a while some small consolation; but then he relapsed into melancholic doubts and anxieties, when he considered that the author had given himself the title of Cid, and consequently must be a Moor; a nation from whom no truth could be expected, they all being given to impose on others with lies and fabulous stories, to falsify and counterfeit, and very fond of their own chimeras. Sancho and Carrasco found him thus agitated and perplexed with a thousand melancholic fancies, which yet did not hinder him from receiving the stranger with a great deal of civility.

This bachelor, though his name was Samson, was none of the biggest in body, but a very great man at all manner of drollery; he had a pale complexion, but good sense. He was about four-and-twenty years of age, round-visaged, flat-nosed, and wide-mouthed, all signs of a disposition that would delight in nothing more than in making sport for himself, by ridiculing others; as he plainly discovered when he saw Don Quixote. For, falling on his knees before him, "Admit me to kiss your honour's hand," cried he, "most noble Don Quixote; for by the habit of St. Peter, which I wear, though indeed I have as yet taken but the four first of the holy orders, you are certainly one of the most renowned knights-errant that ever was, or ever will be, through the whole extent of the habitable globe. Blest may the sage Cid Hamet Benengeli be, for enriching the world with the history of your mighty deeds; and more than blest, that curious virtuoso, who took care to have it translated out of the Arabic into our vulgar tongue, for the universal entertainment of mankind!"

"Sir," said Don Quixote, making him rise, "is it then possible that my history is extant, and that it was a Moor, and one of the sages, that penned it?" "It is so notorious a truth," said the bachelor, "that (...)

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