Don Quixote [Trans. by Edith Grossman] (130 page)
Read Don Quixote [Trans. by Edith Grossman] Online
Authors: Miguel de Cervantes
Tags: #Fiction, #Classics, #Literary, #Knights and knighthood, #Spain, #Literary Criticism, #Spanish & Portuguese, #European, #Don Quixote (Fictitious character)
LETTER FROM TERESA PANZA TO THE DUCHESS
Señora, the letter your highness wrote to me made me very happy, for the truth is it was something I had been wanting. The string of corals is very nice, and my husband’s hunting outfit is just as good. Your ladyship making my spouse, Sancho, a governor has given a lot of pleasure to the whole village, even if nobody believes it, especially the priest, and Master Nicolás the barber, and Sansón Carrasco the bachelor, but that doesn’t bother me; as long as it’s true, which it is, each person can say whatever he wants, though to tell you the truth, if the corals and the outfit hadn’t come I wouldn’t believe it either, because in this village everybody takes my husband for a fool, and except for governing a herd of goats, they can’t imagine what governorship he’d be good for. May God make him good and show him how to see what his children need.
Señora of my soul, I’ve decided, with your grace’s permission, to put this good day in my house
1
by going to court and leaning back in a carriage and making their eyes pop, for there are thousands who are already envious of me; and so I beg Your Excellency to tell my husband to send me some money, and to make it enough, because at court expenses are high: bread sells for a
real,
and a pound of meat costs thirty
maravedís,
which is a judgment,
2
and if he doesn’t want me to go, he should let me know soon, because my feet are itch-
ing to get started; my friends and neighbors tell me that if my daughter and I look grand and important in court, my husband will be known through me and not me through him, because many people are bound to ask: ‘Who are those ladies in that carriage?’ And a servant of mine will respond: ‘The wife and daughter of Sancho Panza, governor of the ínsula of Barataria,’ and in this way Sancho will become known, and I’ll be admired, so let’s get to it, no matter what.
It makes me as sorry as I can be that this year they haven’t picked acorns in this village; even so, I’m sending your highness about half a
celemín;
I went to the woods myself to pick them and pick them over one by one, and I couldn’t find acorns any bigger; I wish they were like ostrich eggs.
Your magnificence mustn’t forget to write to me, and I’ll be sure to answer and tell you about my health and everything there is to tell about in this village, where I’m praying that Our Lord keeps your highness, and doesn’t forget about me. My daughter, Sancha, and my son, kiss the hands of your grace.
Wishing to see your ladyship more than to write to you,
I am your servant,
T
ERESA
P
ANZA
Everyone derived great pleasure from hearing Teresa Panza’s letter, especially the duke and duchess, and the duchess asked Don Quixote if he thought it would be all right to open the letter that had come for the governor, for she imagined it to be very fine. Don Quixote said he would open it in order to give them pleasure, and he did so and saw that it said as follows:
LETTER FROM TERESA PANZA TO HER HUSBAND, SANCHO PANZA
I received your letter, Sancho of my soul, and I can tell you and swear to you as a Catholic Christian that I practically went crazy with happiness. Just think, my husband: when I heard that you were a governor, I thought I’d fall down dead from sheer joy, because you know, people say that sudden joy can kill just like great sorrow. Your daughter, Sanchica, wet herself without realizing it, she was so happy. I had the outfit you sent us in front of me, and the corals my lady the duchess sent around my neck, and both letters in my hands, and the man who brought them right there, and even so I believed and thought that what I saw and touched was all a dream, because who could ever imagine that a goatherd would become a governor of ínsulas? And you know, dear hus
band, my mother used to say you had to live a lot to see a lot: I say this because I plan to see more if I live more, because I don’t plan to stop until I see you as a landlord or a tax collector, for these are trades, after all, in which you always have and handle money, though the devil carries off anyone who misuses them. My lady the duchess will tell you how much I want to go to court; think about it, and let me know if you like the idea, and I’ll try to honor you there by riding in a carriage.
The priest, the barber, the bachelor, and even the sacristan can’t believe you’re a governor; they say it’s all a fraud, or a question of enchantment, like everything that has to do with your master Don Quixote; Sansón says he’ll go to look for you and get the governorship out of your head and Don Quixote’s craziness out of his skull; I don’t do anything but laugh, and look at my necklace, and plan the dress I’ll make for our daughter out of your outfit.
I sent some acorns to my lady the duchess; I wish they were made of gold. Send me some pearl necklaces, if they wear them on that ínsula.
The news from the village is that Berrueca married her daughter to a painter without any talent who came here to paint whatever it turned out to be; the Council told him to paint His Majesty’s coat of arms over the doors of the town hall, he asked for two
ducados,
they paid him in advance, he worked for a week, at the end of that time he hadn’t painted anything, and he said he couldn’t paint trifles; he gave back the money, and even so he got married claiming to be a skilled workman; the truth is he’s put down the brush and picked up a hoe and goes to the fields like a gentleman. Pedro de Lobo’s son has taken orders and has a tonsure and intends to become a priest; Minguilla, Mingo Silvato’s granddaughter, found out and has made a complaint against him, saying he promised to marry her; gossips are saying she’s pregnant by him, but he absolutely denies it.
There are no olives this year, and there’s not a drop of vinegar to be found anywhere in the village. A company of soldiers came through here and took three village girls away with them; I don’t want to tell you who they are: maybe they’ll come back, and there’s bound to be somebody who’ll marry them, with their good or bad qualities.
Sanchica is making lace trimming; she earns eight
maravedís
a day free and clear, and she’s putting them in a money box to help with her dowry, but now that she’s the daughter of a governor, you’ll give her a dowry and she won’t have to work for it. The fountain in the square dried up; lightning hit the pillory, which doesn’t bother me at all.
I’m waiting for your answer to this letter, and a decision about my
going to court; and with this, may God grant you more years than He does me, or as many, because I wouldn’t want to leave you without me in this world.
Your wife,
T
ERESA
P
ANZA
The letters were celebrated, laughed at, approved, and admired; as a final touch, the courier arrived with the letter Sancho had sent to Don Quixote, which was also read publicly, casting doubt on the foolishness of the governor.
The duchess withdrew in order to learn from the page what had occurred in Sancho’s village, which he recounted to her in great detail, not failing to relate every circumstance; he gave her the acorns, as well as a cheese that Teresa had given him because it was very good, even better than the ones from Tronchón.
3
The duchess received it with the greatest pleasure, and with that we shall leave her in order to recount the end of the governorship of the great Sancho Panza, the flower and model of all insular governors.
Regarding the troubled end and conclusion of the governorship of Sancho Panza
To believe that the things of this life will endure forever, unchanged, is to believe the impossible; it seems instead that everything goes around, I mean around in a circle: spring pursues summer, summer pursues
estío,
1
estío
pursues autumn, autumn pursues winter, and winter pursues spring, and in this way time turns around a continuous wheel; only human life races to its end more quickly than time, with no hope for renewal except in the next life, which has no boundaries that limit it. So says Cide Hamete, a Muslim philosopher, because an understanding of the fleeting
impermanence of our present life, and the everlasting nature of the eternal life that awaits us, has been grasped by many without the enlightenment of faith but with only the light of their natural intelligence; but here our author says this because of the speed with which the governorship of Sancho ended, evaporated, dissolved, and disappeared in shadow and smoke.
Sancho was in bed on the seventh night of the days of his governorship, full not of bread or wine, but of judging and giving opinions and issuing statutes and decrees, when sleep, notwithstanding and despite his hunger, began to close his eyes, and he heard such a great noise of bells ringing and voices shouting that it seemed as if the entire ínsula were being destroyed. He sat up in bed, listening attentively to see if he could learn what the cause might be of so much tumult; not only did he fail, but the sound of infinite trumpets and drums was added to the clamor of shouts and bells, leaving him more confused, and more full of fear and consternation; getting out of bed, he put on slippers because the floor was damp, and not bothering with a robe or anything resembling one, he went to the door of his room just in time to see more than twenty persons coming along the corridors, carrying burning torches and holding unsheathed swords in their hands, all of them shouting in loud voices:
“To arms, to arms, Señor Governor, to arms! Infinite enemies have entered the ínsula, and we are lost if your ingenuity and valor do not come to our aid!”
Clamorous, frenzied, in an uproar, they approached the place where Sancho was standing, astonished and stupefied at what he was hearing and seeing, and when they had reached him one of them said:
“Arm yourself immediately, your lordship, or else you will be lost along with the entire ínsula!”
“What do I have to do with arming?” responded Sancho. “And what do I know about arms or coming to anybody’s aid? These things are better left to my master, Don Quixote, who in the wink of an eye would dispatch and see to them. But I, sinner that I am, I don’t know anything about this kind of battle.”
“Ah, Señor Governor!” said another. “What reluctance is this? Arm yourself, your grace, for we bring you both offensive and defensive weapons, and go out to the square, and be our guide and our captain, for by right that is your duty, being our governor.”
“Then arm me, and may it be for the best,” replied Sancho.
And they immediately brought two full-length shields that they had
been carrying and placed them over his nightshirt, not allowing him to put on any other clothing, one shield in front and the other behind, and they pulled his arms through some space they had made, and tied the shields on very carefully with cords, leaving him walled in and boarded up, as straight as a spindle and unable to bend his knees or take a single step. In his hands they placed a lance, which he leaned on in order to keep his balance. When they had him in this state, they told him to walk, and lead them, and encourage them all, for with him as their polestar, their lighthouse, and their lamp, their affairs would have a happy conclusion.
“Wretch that I am, how can I walk,” responded Sancho. “when I can’t move my kneecaps because of these boards sewed up so tight against my body? What you’ll have to do is carry me in your arms and lay me down or stand me up at some postern gate, and I’ll guard it either with this lance or with my body.”
“Go on, Señor Governor,” said another man, “it’s fear more than boards that keeps you from walking; put an end to this, and start to move, for it’s late, our enemies are increasing, their shouts are becoming louder, and the danger is growing.”
Their persuasion and insults prodded the poor governor into moving, and he fell to the ground with such force that he thought he had broken into pieces. He lay there like a giant turtle enclosed and covered by its shells, or like half a side of bacon held between two salting-boards, or even like a boat lying upside down in the sand, but not even when they saw that he had fallen did those mockers have any compassion for him; instead, they put out the torches and shouted even louder, repeating the call to arms with such urgency, and running over poor Sancho and stamping so hard on the shields, that if he had not retreated and pulled back, drawing his head inside the shields, things would have gone very badly for the poor governor who, enclosed in that narrow space, sweated and perspired and with all his heart commended himself to God, praying that He deliver him from that danger.
Some stumbled over him, others fell, and one even stood on top of him for a long while, and from there, as if from a watchtower, he commanded the armies and shouted in a loud voice, saying:
“Our men here, the enemy is pressing hard over here! Guard that opening, close that gate, down with those ladders! Bring the pitch-pots,
2
the tar and resin in cauldrons of burning oil! Barricade the streets with mattresses!”
In short, he named with great zeal all the implements and instruments and tools of war used to prevent an attack on a city, and the battered Sancho, who heard and suffered it all, said to himself:
“Oh, if only Our Lord would put an end to the loss of this ínsula, and I would find myself dead or free of this affliction!”
Heaven heard his prayer, and when he least expected it, he heard voices shouting:
“Victory, victory! The enemy is retreating! Oh, Señor Governor, your grace should get up and come enjoy the conquest and divide the spoils taken from the enemy by the valor of that invincible arm!”
“Pick me up,” the dolorous Sancho said in a doleful voice.
They helped him to his feet, and when he was standing he said: