Miguel Cervantes

THE HISTORY OF DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA
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CHAPTER LXXIV.

How Sancho Panza was carried to his government; and of the strange adventure that befell Don Quixote in the castle.

After dinner, Don Quixote gave Sancho, in writing, the copy of his verbal instructions, ordering him to get somebody to read them to him. But the squire had no sooner got them, than he dropt the paper, which fell into the duke's hands, who communicating the same to the duchess, they found a fresh occasion of admiring the mixture of Don Quixote's good sense and extravagance; and so, carrying on the humour, they sent Sancho that afternoon, with a suitable equipage, to the place he was to govern, which, wherever it lay, was to be an island to him.

It happened that the management of this affair was committed to a steward of the duke's, a man of a facetious humour, and who had not only wit to start a pleasant design, but discretion to carry it on. He had already personated the Countess Trifaldi very successfully; and, with his master's instructions in relation to his behaviour towards Sancho, could not but discharge his trust to a wonder. Now it fell out, that Sancho no sooner cast his eyes on the steward than he fancied he saw the very face of Trifaldi; and turning to his master, "Look, sir," quoth he, "and see if this same steward of the duke's here has not the very face of my Lady Trifaldi." Don Quixote looked very earnestly on the steward, and having perused him from top to toe, "Sancho," said he, "thou art in the right; I see their faces are the very same. Yet, for all that, the steward and the disconsolate lady cannot be the same person, for that would imply a very great contradiction, and might involve us in more abstruse and difficult doubts than we have conveniency now to discuss or examine. Believe me, friend, our devotion cannot be too earnest, that we may be delivered from the power of these cursed enchantments." "You may think, sir," quoth Sancho, "that I am in jest, but I heard him speak just now, and I thought the very voice of Madam Trifaldi sounded in my ears. But mum is the word; I say nothing, though I shall watch him well, to find out whether I am right or wrong in my suspicion." "Well, do so," said Don Quixote; "and fail not to acquaint me with all the discoveries thou canst make in this affair, and other occurrences in thy government."

At last, Sancho set out with a numerous train. He was dressed like a man of the long-robe, and wore over his other [Pg 326] clothes a white sad-coloured coat or gown, of watered camblet, and a cap of the same stuff. He was mounted on a mule; and behind him, by the duke's order, was led his Dapple, bridled and saddled like a horse of state, in gaudy trappings of silk; which so delighted Sancho, that every now and then he turned his head about to look upon him, and thought himself so happy, that now he would not have changed fortunes with the Emperor (...)

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