Chapter XXXVII. In which the famous adventure of the Sorrowing Duenna is continued
The duke and the duchess were exceedingly pleased to see how well Don Quixote was answering to their purpose, and at this point Sancho said:
“I wouldn’t want this lady duenna to put some stumbling block in the way of the promise of my government, because I’ve heard a Toledo apothecary who talked like a goldfinch say that wherever duennas had a hand nothing good could happen. God help me, and how badly that apothecary got on with them! From which I gather that, since all duennas are tiresome and meddlesome, of whatever quality and condition they may be, what will the sorrowing ones be like, as they say this Countess Three Skirts, or Three Tails, is? For in my country skirts and tails, tails and skirts, it’s all one.”
“Be quiet, Sancho my friend,” said Don Quixote, “for, since this lady duenna comes from lands so far afar to seek me, she cannot be one of those the apothecary counted among his number; all the more so since this one is a countess, and when countesses serve as duennas, it will be in the service of queens and empresses, who in their own houses are most lordly ladies served by other duennas.”
To this Doña Rodríguez, who happened to be present, answered:
“My lady the duchess has duennas in her service who might have been countesses if fortune had willed it, but laws go where kings want them to; and let no one speak ill of duennas, and least of all of the old maiden ones; for though I am not one, I can well see and make out the advantage a maiden duenna has over a widowed duenna; and whoever sheared us was left with the scissors in his hand.”
“For all that,” replied Sancho, “there’s so much to shear in duennas, according to my barber, that it’ll be best not to stir the rice, even if it sticks.”
“Squires are always our enemies,” answered Doña Rodríguez, “for, as they are the hobgoblins of the anterooms and see us at every step, the times they are not praying, which are many, they spend gossiping about us, digging up our bones and burying our good name. Well, I give notice to these walking logs that, whether they like it or not, we are to live in the world, and in great houses, though we die of hunger and cover our delicate or not so delicate flesh with a black nun’s habit, like someone covering or hiding a dunghill with a wall hanging on a procession day. On my faith, if I were given leave, and the time called for it, I would make it understood, not only to those present but to the whole world, that there is no virtue that is not contained in a duenna.”
“I believe,” said the duchess, “that my good Doña Rodríguez is right, and very right; but she had better wait for a fit time to stand up for herself and for the other duennas, to confound the bad opinion of that bad apothecary and to root out the one the great Sancho Panza has in his breast.”
To which Sancho answered:
“Since I’ve had a governor’s airs in my head, a squire’s dizzy spells have left me, and I don’t care a wild fig for all the duennas there are.”
They would have gone on with this duennaish colloquy if they had not heard the fife and drums strike up again, by which they understood that the Sorrowing Duenna was coming in. The duchess asked the duke whether it would be well to go out to receive her, since she was a countess and a person of rank.
“As far as her being a countess goes,” answered Sancho, before the duke could answer, “I’m all for your greatnesses going out to receive her; but as for her being a duenna, I’m of the opinion that you shouldn’t stir a step.”
“Who asked you to meddle in this, Sancho?” said Don Quixote.
“Who, sir?” answered Sancho. “I meddle, because I can meddle, as a squire who has learned the terms of courtesy in your grace’s school, and your grace is the most courteous and well-bred knight there is in all courtliness; and in these things, as I’ve heard your grace say, you lose as much by a card too many as by a card too few; and to the good understander, few words.”
“It is just as Sancho says,” said the duke. “We shall see the countess’s figure, and by it we shall gauge the courtesy that is due to her.”
At this the drums and the fife came in, as they had the first time.
And here, with this short chapter, the author made an end, and began the next, following the same adventure, which is one of the most notable in the history.