Chapter LXVI. Which deals with what he who reads it will see, or he who hears it read will hear

As he left Barcelona, Don Quixote turned to look at the place where he had fallen, and said:

“Here Troy was! Here my misfortune, and not my cowardice, carried off the glories I had won; here fortune worked her twists and turns on me; here my deeds were darkened; here, in short, my luck fell, never to rise again!”

Hearing which, Sancho said:

“It’s as much the part of brave hearts, my master, to have patience in misfortunes as to have joy in good times; and I judge this by myself, for if I was cheerful when I was a governor, now that I’m a squire on foot I’m not sad; because I’ve heard it said that this thing they call Fortune around here is a drunken, whimsical woman, and, above all, blind, and so she doesn’t see what she’s doing, or know whom she’s knocking down, or whom she’s raising up.”

“You are very much the philosopher, Sancho,” answered Don Quixote; “you speak very sensibly: I do not know who teaches you. What I can tell you is that there is no fortune in the world, nor do the things that happen in it, be they good or bad, come about by chance, but by the particular providence of heaven; and hence comes what is commonly said: that each man is the craftsman of his own fortune. I have been the craftsman of mine, but not with the prudence that was needed, and so my presumptions have come to grief; for I ought to have thought that the weakness of Rocinante could not hold out against the mighty bulk of the horse of the Knight of the White Moon. In the end I dared, I did what I could, I was overthrown, and, though I lost my honor, the virtue of keeping my word I did not lose, nor can I lose it. In my days as a knight-errant, daring and brave, I made my exploits good with my works and with my hands; and now, when I am a squire on foot, I shall make my words good by keeping the one I gave in my promise. Go on, then, Sancho, my friend, and let us go and spend the year of our novitiate in our own country, and in that seclusion we shall gather new strength to return to the exercise of arms, which I shall never forget.”

“Sir,” answered Sancho, “walking on foot isn’t such a pleasant thing that it moves and stirs me to make long days’ marches. Let’s leave this armor hanging on some tree, in place of a hanged man, and, with me taking up the gray’s back, my feet off the ground, we’ll make the marches as your grace asks and measures them; for to think I’m going to travel on foot and make them long is to think of what can’t be done.”

“You have spoken well, Sancho,” answered Don Quixote. “Let my arms be hung up as a trophy, and at the foot of them, or around them, we shall carve on the trees what was written on the trophy of Roldán’s arms:

Let no one move them
who cannot stand the test with Roldán.”

“All that strikes me as just pearls,” answered Sancho; “and if it weren’t for the want we’d have of Rocinante on the road, it would be good to leave him hanging too.”

“Well, I will not have either him or the armor hanged,” replied Don Quixote, “so that it may not be said: for good service, poor reward!”

“Your grace says very well,” answered Sancho, “because, in the opinion of sensible people, the ass’s fault is not to be laid on the packsaddle; and since your grace is to blame for this business, punish yourself, and don’t let your rage burst out on the armor, broken and bloody already, or on the gentleness of Rocinante, or on the tenderness of my feet, by wanting them to walk more than is fair.”

In these discussions and talks the whole of that day went by for them, and four more besides, without anything happening to hinder their journey; and on the fifth day, at the entrance to a village, they found many people at the door of a tavern, who, it being a holiday, were enjoying themselves there. As Don Quixote was coming up to them, a farmer raised his voice, saying:

“One of these two gentlemen coming this way, who don’t know the parties, will say what’s to be done about our wager.”

“That I will, to be sure,” answered Don Quixote, “with all fairness, if I manage to understand it.”

“The case, then, good sir,” said the farmer, “is that a man of this village, so fat that he weighs eleven arrobas, challenged another neighbor of his, who weighs no more than five, to run a race. The condition was that they were to run a hundred-pace course carrying equal weights; and, when they asked the challenger how the weight was to be made equal, he said that the challenged man, who weighs five arrobas, should put six arrobas of iron on his back, and in that way the thin man’s eleven arrobas would be made equal to the fat man’s eleven.”

“Not that way,” said Sancho at this point, before Don Quixote could answer. “And it falls to me, since, as everybody knows, I quit being a governor and a judge only a few days ago, to settle these doubts and give an opinion in every lawsuit.”

“Answer, and welcome,” said Don Quixote, “Sancho, my friend, for I am in no state to give crumbs to a cat, my wits are so troubled and turned upside down.”

With this leave, Sancho said to the farmers, many of whom stood around him with their mouths open, waiting for the sentence from his lips:

“Brothers, what the fat man asks has no sense to it, nor any shadow of justice at all; because if what they say is true, that the challenged man may choose the weapons, it’s not right for this one to choose such as will hinder or keep him from coming out the winner; and so it’s my opinion that the fat challenger should trim, prune, thin, polish, and tidy himself, and take six arrobas off his flesh, from here or there on his body, wherever he thinks best and suits him best; and in this way, being left at five arrobas’ weight, he’ll be made equal and even with the five of his opponent, and so they’ll be able to run on equal terms.”

“I swear,” said a farmer who heard Sancho’s sentence, “this gentleman has spoken like a blessed saint and given sentence like a canon! But it’s a safe bet the fat man won’t want to take an ounce off his flesh, let alone six arrobas.”

“The best thing is for them not to run,” answered another, “so the thin one won’t be crushed by the weight, nor the fat one stripped of his flesh; and let half the wager be put into wine, and let’s take these gentlemen to the tavern with the good stuff, and when it rains, let it rain on my cloak.”

“I thank you, sirs,” answered Don Quixote, “but I cannot stop for a moment, because sad thoughts and sad events make me seem discourteous and travel faster than at a walk.”

And so, putting spurs to Rocinante, he went on, leaving them amazed at having seen and noted both his strange figure and the good sense of his servant, for so they judged Sancho to be. And another of the farmers said:

“If the servant is so sensible, what must the master be like! I’ll bet that if they go to study at Salamanca, they’ll come within a hair of being court judges; for it’s all a joke, except studying and more studying, and having favor and luck; and when a man least expects it, he finds himself with a staff of office in his hand or a miter on his head.”

That night master and man spent in the middle of the fields, under the clear, open sky; and the next day, as they went on their way, they saw a man on foot coming toward them, with a pair of saddlebags around his neck and a javelin or pike in his hand, the very picture of a foot courier; who, when he came near Don Quixote, quickened his pace, and, half running, reached him, and, hugging him by the right thigh, for he could reach no higher, said to him with signs of great joy:

“Oh, my lord Don Quixote of La Mancha, and what great happiness will come to the heart of my lord the duke when he learns that your grace is going back to his castle, for he is still there with my lady the duchess!”

“I do not know you, friend,” answered Don Quixote, “nor can I know who you are if you do not tell me.”

“I, Señor Don Quixote,” answered the courier, “am Tosilos, the duke my lord’s lackey, the one who wouldn’t fight with your grace over the marriage of Doña Rodríguez’s daughter.”

“God save us!” said Don Quixote. “Is it possible that you are the one whom the enchanters my enemies transformed into that lackey you speak of, to defraud me of the honor of that battle?”

“Hush, good sir,” replied the letter carrier, “for there was no enchantment at all nor any change of face: as much the lackey Tosilos did I enter the lists as Tosilos the lackey did I come out of them. I meant to get married without fighting, because I had taken a liking to the girl, but my plan turned out the other way round for me, for as soon as your grace left our castle, the duke my lord had me given a hundred blows with a stick for having gone against the orders he had given me before going into the battle, and it has all ended with the girl a nun by now, and Doña Rodríguez gone back to Castile, and me on my way now to Barcelona, to take a packet of letters to the viceroy that my master is sending him. If your grace would like a little drink, warm but neat, I have here a gourd full of the good stuff, with I don’t know how many slices of Tronchón cheese, which will serve to call up and wake the thirst, if by chance it’s asleep.”

“I’ll take up that bid,” said Sancho, “and let courtesy stake all it has left, and let the good Tosilos pour, in spite of and to the sorrow of all the enchanters there are in the Indies.”

“In short,” said Don Quixote, “you are, Sancho, the greatest glutton in the world and the most ignorant man on earth, since you cannot be persuaded that this courier is enchanted and this Tosilos a counterfeit. Stay with him and stuff yourself, for I will go on slowly ahead, waiting for you to come.”

The lackey laughed, unsheathed his gourd, unpacked his slices, and, taking out a small loaf, he and Sancho sat down on the green grass, and in good peace and company they polished off the whole store of the saddlebags and got to the bottom of it, with such good appetites that they licked the packet of letters, just because it smelled of cheese. Tosilos said to Sancho:

“No doubt, Sancho, my friend, this master of yours is bound to be a madman.”

“Bound?” answered Sancho. “He’s bound to nobody, for he pays for everything, and all the more when the coin is madness. I see it well enough, and I tell him so well enough; but what good does it do? And all the more now that he’s done for, because he’s been vanquished by the Knight of the White Moon.”

Tosilos begged him to tell him what had happened to him, but Sancho answered that it was discourteous to keep his master waiting for him; that some other day, if they met, there would be a chance for it. And, getting up, after shaking out his smock and the crumbs from his beard, he drove the gray on ahead of him, and, saying “God be with you,” he left Tosilos and caught up with his master, who was waiting for him in the shade of a tree.