Chapter LXIX. Of the strangest and newest event that befell Don Quixote in the whole course of this great history

The horsemen dismounted, and, together with those on foot, picking Sancho and Don Quixote up bodily and in a rush, carried them into the courtyard, around which nearly a hundred torches were burning in their stands, and along the galleries of the courtyard more than five hundred lights; so that, in spite of the night, which was rather dark, the lack of day could not be noticed. In the middle of the courtyard there rose a catafalque some two yards from the ground, entirely covered by a very large canopy of black velvet, around which, on its steps, white wax candles burned on more than a hundred silver candlesticks; and on top of this catafalque lay the dead body of a damsel so beautiful that by her beauty she made death itself seem beautiful. Her head rested on a brocade pillow, crowned with a garland woven of various sweet-smelling flowers, her hands were crossed on her breast, and between them was a branch of yellow, victorious palm.

On one side of the courtyard a stage had been set up, and on two chairs sat two personages who, since they had crowns on their heads and scepters in their hands, gave signs of being kings of some sort, whether real or feigned. Beside this stage, which was reached by some steps, were two other chairs, on which those who had brought the prisoners seated Don Quixote and Sancho, all this in silence, and giving the two of them to understand by signs that they too should be silent; but without anyone signaling to them, they kept silent, because wonder at what they were looking at had tied their tongues.

At this point two personages of rank came up onto the stage with a great retinue, and Don Quixote at once knew them to be the duke and the duchess, his hosts, who sat down on two very rich chairs beside the two who looked like kings. Who would not have marveled at this, the more so as Don Quixote had recognized that the dead body lying on the catafalque was that of the beautiful Altisidora?

As the duke and duchess came up onto the stage, Don Quixote and Sancho rose and made them a deep bow, and the duke and duchess did the same, bending their heads a little.

At this point an attendant came out from the side, and, going up to Sancho, threw over him a robe of black buckram all painted with flames of fire, and, taking off his cap, put on his head a tall pointed cap, of the kind worn by those the Holy Office has sentenced to penance; and he told him in his ear not to unseal his lips, or they would put a gag on him or take his life. Sancho looked himself up and down and saw himself burning in flames, but since they did not burn him, he did not value them at two ardites. He took off the pointed cap, saw it painted with devils, and put it back on, saying to himself:

“So far so good: these don’t burn me and those don’t carry me off.”

Don Quixote looked at him too, and, though fear held his senses in suspense, he could not help laughing to see Sancho’s figure. At this there began to come, it seemed, from under the catafalque a soft and pleasant sound of flutes, which, since no human voice hindered it, for in that place silence itself kept silent, sounded gentle and loving. Then, suddenly, there appeared beside the pillow of the seeming corpse a handsome youth dressed in the Roman fashion, who, to the sound of a harp that he himself played, sang these two stanzas in a very sweet, clear voice:

“Until Altisidora wakes again,
who died of Don Quixote’s cruelty,
and while, at the enchanted court, the ladies
go dressed in coarse cloth woven of goat’s hair,
and while my lady clothes her duennas
in baize and in the serge that mourners wear,
I’ll sing her beauty and her sad mischance
with better plectrum than the Thracian bard.
Nor do I fancy that this office falls
to me alone so long as I have life;
but with my tongue cold, dead within my mouth,
I mean to raise the voice that is your due.
My soul, set free from its confining rock,
and guided over the Stygian lake,
will go on praising you, and that same sound
will make the waters of oblivion stand.”

“No more,” said one of the two who looked like kings at this point, “no more, divine singer; for it would be to go on without end to set before us now the death and the graces of the peerless Altisidora, not dead, as the ignorant world thinks, but alive on the tongues of Fame, and in the penance that Sancho Panza, here present, must undergo to bring her back to the light she has lost; and so, O you, Rhadamanthus, who judge with me in the gloomy caverns of Lite, since you know all that is decreed in the inscrutable fates concerning this damsel’s coming back to herself, speak and declare it at once, so that the happiness we hope for from her return may not be delayed for us.”

Scarcely had Minos, judge and companion of Rhadamanthus, said this, when Rhadamanthus rose to his feet and said:

“Come, attendants of this house, high and low, great and small, come one after another and seal Sancho’s face with twenty-four chucks under the chin, and twelve pinches and six pinpricks on his arms and back, for on this ceremony depends the health of Altisidora!”

Hearing which, Sancho Panza broke his silence and said:

“I swear I’ll let my face be sealed or pawed about as soon as I’ll turn Moor! Body of me! What has pawing my face got to do with the resurrection of this damsel? The old woman has got a taste for the greens. They enchant Dulcinea, and they whip me so she’ll be disenchanted; Altisidora dies of ailments God chose to give her, and to bring her back to life they have to give me twenty-four chucks under the chin and riddle my body with pinpricks and bruise my arms black and blue with pinches! Play those jokes on a brother-in-law, for I’m an old dog, and there’s no ‘here, boy, here’ with me!”

“You shall die!” said Rhadamanthus in a loud voice. “Soften, you tiger; humble yourself, you proud Nimrod, and suffer and be still, since nothing impossible is asked of you. And do not meddle in inquiring into the difficulties of this business: chin-chucked you shall be, pricked full of holes you shall see yourself, pinched you shall groan. Come, I say, attendants, carry out my command; if not, on the faith of an honest man, you shall see what you were born for!”

At this there appeared, coming across the courtyard, some six duennas in procession, one behind another, four of them in spectacles, and all with their right hands raised on high, with four fingers’ breadth of wrist showing, to make their hands look longer, as is the fashion now. No sooner had Sancho seen them than, bellowing like a bull, he said:

“I could let myself be pawed by the whole world, but agree to let duennas touch me, that I won’t! Let them scratch my face like cats, as they did to my master in this very castle; let them run my body through with the points of sharpened daggers; let them tear at my arms with red-hot pincers, and I’ll bear it with patience, or serve these gentlemen; but let duennas touch me I will not allow, though the devil should carry me off.”

Don Quixote broke his silence too, saying to Sancho:

“Have patience, my son, and give these lords pleasure, and many thanks to heaven for having put such virtue in your person that by its martyrdom you disenchant the enchanted and raise the dead.”

By now the duennas were near Sancho, when he, softer and more persuaded, settling himself well in his chair, offered his face and beard to the first, who gave him a very well-sealed chuck under the chin, and then a deep curtsy.

“Less courtesy and less face paint, madam duenna,” said Sancho, “for, by God, your hands smell of vinegar wash!”

In the end all the duennas sealed him, and many other people of the house pinched him; but what he could not bear was the pricking of the pins; and so he rose from his chair, angry by all appearances, and, seizing a lighted torch that was near him, went after the duennas and all his executioners, saying:

“Away, infernal attendants, for I’m not made of bronze, that I shouldn’t feel such extraordinary torments!”

At this Altisidora, who must have been tired from having lain so long on her back, turned on her side; which the bystanders seeing, almost all of them said with one voice:

“Altisidora is alive! Altisidora lives!”

Rhadamanthus ordered Sancho to put aside his anger, since the end they had sought had now been achieved.

As soon as Don Quixote saw Altisidora stir, he went and knelt before Sancho, saying to him:

“Now is the time, son of my very heart, rather than squire of mine, for you to give yourself some of the lashes you are bound to give for the disenchantment of Dulcinea. Now, I say, is the time when your virtue is ripe and has the power to work the good that is hoped of you.”

To which Sancho answered:

“This looks to me like trick upon trick, and not honey on pancakes. It would be a fine thing if after pinches, chucks under the chin, and pinpricks the lashes came along now! All they have to do is take a big stone and tie it to my neck and throw me down a well, which wouldn’t trouble me much, if I’m to be the wedding cow for curing other people’s ills. Leave me alone; if not, by God, I’ll throw the whole lot down and let it all go at thirteen, even if it doesn’t sell.”

By now Altisidora had sat up on the catafalque, and at the same instant the shawms sounded, accompanied by the flutes and the voices of all, who cried:

“Long live Altisidora! Altisidora, long may she live!”

The duke and duchess and the kings Minos and Rhadamanthus rose, and all together, with Don Quixote and Sancho, went to receive Altisidora and help her down from the catafalque; and she, playing the part of one in a swoon, bowed to the duke and duchess and to the kings, and, looking askance at Don Quixote, said to him:

“God forgive you, loveless knight, for through your cruelty I have been in the other world, it seems to me, more than a thousand years; and to you, O most compassionate squire the globe contains, I give thanks for the life I possess. From this day forth, Sancho, my friend, you may dispose of six shifts of mine that I am leaving you so you can make six shirts for yourself; and if they are not all whole, at least they are all clean.”

Sancho kissed her hands for it, with the pointed cap in his hand and his knees on the ground. The duke ordered them to take it from him and give him back his cap, and put on his smock, and take off the robe of flames. Sancho begged the duke that the robe and the miter be left with him, for he wanted to take them home to his village as a token and remembrance of that never-seen event. The duchess answered that they would indeed leave them to him, for he already knew what a great friend of his she was. The duke ordered the courtyard cleared and everyone to withdraw to their rooms, and Don Quixote and Sancho to be taken to the ones they already knew.