Don Quixote [Trans. by Edith Grossman] (77 page)

Now, however, sloth triumphs over diligence, idleness over work, vice over virtue, arrogance over valor, and theory over the practice of arms, which lived and shone only in the Golden Age and in the time of the knights errant. If you do not agree, then tell me: who was more virtuous and valiant than the famed Amadís of Gaul? Who more intelligent than Palmerín of England? Who more accommodating and good-natured than Tirant lo Blanc? Who more gallant than Lisuarte of Greece? Who more combative with the sword than Don Belianís? Who more intrepid than Perión of Gaul, or more audacious in the face of danger than Felixmarte of Hyrcania, or more sincere than Esplandián? Who bolder than Don Cirongilio of Thrace? Who more courageous than Rodamonte? Who more prudent than King Sobrino? Who more daring than Reinaldos? Who more invincible than Roland? And who more elegant and courteous than Ruggiero, from whom the modern-day Dukes of Ferrara are descended, according to Turpin in his
Cosmography?
All these knights, and many others I could mention, Señor Priest, were knights errant, the light and glory of chivalry. They, or knights like them, are the ones I would like for my scheme; if they were part of it, His Majesty would be well served and save a good deal of money, and the
Turk would be left tearing his beard; therefore I shall remain in my house, since the chaplain has not taken me out of it, and if his Jupiter, as the barber has said, does not rain, here am I, and I shall rain whenever I please. I say this so that Señor Basin will know I understand him.”

“The truth is, Señor Don Quixote,” said the barber, “this is not why I told the story, and as God is my witness my intentions were good, and your grace should not be offended.”

“I know very well,” responded Don Quixote, “whether or not I should be offended.”

At this juncture the priest said:

“Although I have hardly said a word until now, I should like to express some misgivings that are gnawing and scratching at my conscience, and were caused by what Señor Don Quixote said here.”

“The Señor Priest has permission for many things,” responded Don Quixote, “and so he may state his misgivings, for it is not pleasant to have a conscience filled with them.”

“Well, having received this approval,” responded the priest, “I say that these are my misgivings: I am not at all convinced that this crowd of knights errant to whom your grace, Señor Don Quixote, has referred, were really and truly persons of flesh and blood who lived in the world; rather, I imagine they are all fiction, fable, falsehood—dreams told by men when they are awake, or, I should say, half-asleep.”

“That is another error,” responded Don Quixote, “into which many have fallen: they do not believe that such knights ever existed in the world, and with a variety of people and on different occasions, I have often attempted to bring this common misconception into the light of truth; sometimes I have not succeeded in my intention, and at other times I have, supporting it on the shoulders of truth, and this truth is so certain I can almost say I have seen Amadís of Gaul with my own eyes: tall, with a pale face and nicely trimmed black beard and a gaze both gentle and severe, he was a man of few words, slow to anger and quick to put aside wrath; and just as I have depicted Amadís, I could, I believe, portray and describe all the knights errant who wander through all the histories in the world, because it is my understanding that they were just as their histories recount, and by means of the deeds they performed and the circumstances in which they lived, and by using sound philosophy, one can deduce their features, their natures, and their stature.”

“Then how tall does your grace, Señor Don Quixote,” asked the barber, “think the giant Morgante was?”

“In the matter of giants,” responded Don Quixote, “there are different opinions as to whether or not they ever existed in the world, but Holy Scripture, which cannot deviate an iota from the truth, shows us that they did by telling us the history of that huge Philistine Goliath, whose stature was seven and a half cubits, which is inordinately tall. And on the island of Sicily, shin bones and shoulder bones have been discovered which are so large that it is clear they belonged to giants as tall as a tall tower; geometry proves this truth beyond any doubt. But despite all this, I could not say with certainty how big Morgante was, though I imagine he was not very tall; I am of this opinion because in his history, when there is particular mention of his deeds, he often was sleeping under a roof, and since he could find a house large enough to hold him, it is obvious his size was not exceptional.”

“That is true,” said the priest, who enjoyed hearing so much foolishness, and asked his feelings with regard to the appearance of Reinaldos de Montalbán, Don Roland, and the other Twelve Peers of France, for they all had been knights errant.

“With respect to Reinaldos,” responded Don Quixote, “I daresay his face was broad and ruddy, his eyes merry and rather prominent, his temperament excessively punctilious and choleric, and that he was a friend of thieves and other dissolute people. With respect to Roland, or Roldán, or Rotolando, or Orlando, for he is called all these names in the histories, I believe and declare that he was of medium height, broad-shouldered, somewhat bowlegged, with a dark complexion and a blond beard, a hairy body and a threatening demeanor, a man of few words but very courteous and well-bred.”

“If Roland was not more of a gentleman than your grace has indicated,” replied the priest, “it is not surprising that Señora Angelica the Fair scorned him and left him for the elegance, spirit, and charm that the downy-cheeked Moorish lad to whom she gave herself must have possessed, and she was wise to fall madly in love with Medoro’s gentleness rather than Roland’s harshness.”

“Angelica, Señor Priest,” responded Don Quixote, “was a pleasure-seeker, a gadabout, and a somewhat capricious damsel, and she left the world as full of her impertinences as it was filled with the fame of her beauty: she scorned a thousand brave and intelligent gentlemen, and was satisfied with a little beardless page who had no property or name other than a reputation for gratitude because of his loyalty to a friend. The great singer of her beauty, the famous Ariosto, did not dare or wish
to sing what happened to the lady after she so ruinously gave herself to Medoro, for they could not have been overly virtuous things, and he left her at the point where he says:

And no doubt this was a kind of prophecy; poets are called
vates,
which means they are
soothsayers.
This truth can be clearly seen because since then a famous Andalusian poet wept over and sang of her tears, and another famous and unique Castilian poet sang of her beauty.”
⁴

“Tell me, Señor Don Quixote,” said the barber, “among all those who praised her, hasn’t there ever been a poet who wrote a satire of this Señora Angelica?”
⁵

“I do believe,” responded Don Quixote, “that if Sacripante or Roland had been poets, they would already have reprimanded the damsel as she deserved, because it is right and natural for poets who have been scorned and rejected by their imagined ladies, or by the imagined ladies of the characters they have created in their works, whom they have chosen as the mistresses of their thoughts, to take their revenge with satires and attacks, a revenge most certainly unworthy of generous hearts; but until now I have not heard of a single verse attacking Señora Angelica, who turned the world upside down.”

“Miraculous!” said the priest.

And at this point they heard the housekeeper and niece, who had already abandoned the conversation, shouting in the courtyard, and they all hurried to the site of the noise.

CHAPTER II

Our history recounts that the cries heard by Don Quixote, the priest, and the barber came from the niece and housekeeper and were directed at Sancho Panza, who was struggling to come in to see Don Quixote, while they barred his way, shouting:

“What does this vagabond want in our house? Go back home, brother, for you and nobody else lead our master astray and lure him out of his house and take him to those godforsaken places.”

To which Sancho responded:

“Housekeeper from hell, the one who’s lured and led astray and taken to godforsaken places is me, not your master; he led me everywhere, and you two are deceived and are blaming the wrong person; he lured me out of my house with tricks and lies, promising me an ínsula that I’m still waiting for.”

“I hope you choke on those damned ínsulas, Sancho, you wretch,” responded the niece. “And what are ínsulas? Something to eat, you greedy glutton?”

“It’s not something to eat,” replied Sancho, “but something to govern and rule better than any town council or magistrate in criminal court.”

“Even so,” said the housekeeper, “you won’t come in, you bag of evil and sack of wickedness. Go and govern your own house and work your parcel of land and stop trying to rule ínsulas or ínsulos or whatever you call them.”

The priest and the barber were delighted to hear this three-way conversation, but Don Quixote, fearful that Sancho would blurt out and disclose a quantity of malicious nonsense and touch on points that would
not redound to his credit, called to him and made the two women be quiet and allow him to enter. Sancho came in, and the priest and the barber took their leave of Don Quixote, in despair over his health, for they saw how fixed his foolish ideas were and how enthralled he was by the nonsense of his calamitously errant chivalry; and so, the priest said to the barber:

“You’ll see, compadre, that when we least expect it, our gentleman will leave again and beat the bushes, putting all the birds to flight.”

“I have no doubt about that,” responded the barber, “but I’m not as astounded by the madness of the knight as I am by the simplicity of the squire, who has so much faith in the story of the ínsula that I don’t believe all the disappointments imaginable will ever get it out of his head.”

“May God help them,” said the priest, “and let us be on the alert: we’ll see where all the foolishness in this knight and squire will lead, because it seems as if both were made from the same mold, and that the madness of the master, without the simplicity of the servant, would not be worth anything.”

“That’s true,” said the barber, “and I’d certainly like to know what they’re talking about now.”

“I assure you,” responded the priest, “that the niece or the housekeeper will tell us later, because they’re not the kind not to eavesdrop.”

In the meantime, Don Quixote had taken Sancho into his room and closed the door, and when they were alone, he said:

“It grieves me, Sancho, that you have said and still say that I lured you away, knowing that I did not remain in my own house; we went out together, we left together, and we traveled together; together we shared a single fortune and a single fate: if you were tossed in a blanket once, I was battered and bruised a hundred times, and that is the one advantage I have over you.”

“That was right and proper,” responded Sancho, “because, according to your grace, misfortunes afflict knights errant more than their squires.”

“You are wrong, Sancho,” said Don Quixote. “As the saying goes,
Quando caput dolet—”

“I don’t understand any language but my own,” responded Sancho.

“I mean,” said Don Quixote, “that when the head aches, all the other members ache, too; since I am your lord and master, I am your head, and you my part, for you are my servant; for this reason, the evil that touches or may touch me will cause you pain, and yours will do the same to me.”

“That’s how it should be,” said Sancho, “but when they tossed me, a
member, in the blanket, my head was behind the fence watching me fly through the air and not feeling any pain at all; since the members are obliged to suffer the pains of the head, the head should be obliged to feel their pains, too.”

“Do you mean to say, Sancho,” responded Don Quixote, “that I felt no pain when you were tossed in the blanket? If that is what you mean, do not say it and do not think it, for at the time I felt more pain in my spirit than you did in your body. But let us put that aside for now; there will be time for us to ponder this and draw the proper conclusion; tell me, Sancho my friend: what are people saying about me in the village? What opinion of me do the commoners have, and the gentlefolk, and the knights? What do they say about my valor, my deeds, and my courtesy? What is the talk with regard to my undertaking to revive and bring back to the world the forgotten order of chivalry? In short, Sancho, I want you to tell me what has reached your ears regarding this, and you must tell me without adding anything to the good or taking anything away from the bad, for it is fitting that loyal vassals tell the exact and unvarnished truth to their lords, not swelling it because of adulation or allowing any other idle considerations to lessen it; and I want you to know, Sancho, that if the naked truth, bare of flattery, were to reach the ears of princes, the times would be different and other ages would be deemed to be of iron when compared to our own, which, I believe, would be considered golden. Heed this warning, Sancho, and with good sense and intentions bring to my ears the truth of what you know in response to what I have asked you.”

“I will do that very gladly, Señor,” responded Sancho, “on the condition that your grace will not be angry at what I say, since you want me to tell the naked truth and not dress it in any clothes except the ones it was wearing when I heard it.”

“Under no circumstances shall I be angry,” responded Don Quixote. “You may certainly speak freely, Sancho, without evasions.”

“Well, the first thing I’ll say,” he said, “is that the common people think your grace is a great madman, and that I’m just as great a simpleton. The gentry say you have not stayed within the bounds of being a gentleman and have called yourself
Don
¹
and rushed into being a knight when you have just a vine or two and a couple of fields and nothing but rags on your back. The knights say they wouldn’t want the minor gentry
to compete with them, especially those squirish gentlefolk who polish their shoes with lampblack and mend their black stockings with green thread.”