Wherein is related the stratagem practised by Sancho, of enchanting the Lady Dulcinea; with other events no less ludicrous than true.

The knight's frenzy appears now to be carried to an excess beyond all conception. Having retired into a grove near the city of Toboso, he despatched Sancho with orders not to return into his presence till he had spoken to his lady, beseeching her that she would be pleased to grant her captive knight permission to wait upon her, and that she would deign to bestow on him her benediction, whereby he might secure complete success in all his encounters and arduous enterprises. Sancho promised to return with an answer no less favourable than that which he had formerly brought him. "Go then, son," replied Don Quixote, "and be not in confusion when thou standest in the blaze of that sun of beauty. Happy thou above all the squires in the world! Deeply impress on thy memory the particulars of thy reception—whether she changes colour while thou art delivering thy embassy, and betrays agitation on hearing my name; whether her cushion cannot hold her, if perchance thou shouldst find her seated on the rich Estrado; or, if standing, mark whether she is not obliged to sustain herself sometimes upon one foot and sometimes upon the other; whether she repeats her answer to thee three or four times: in short, observe all her actions and motions; for by an accurate detail of them I shall be enabled to penetrate into the secret recesses of her heart touching the affair of my love; for let me tell thee, Sancho, that with lovers the external actions and gestures are couriers, which bear authentic tidings of what is passing in the interior of the soul. Go, friend, and be thou more successful than my anxious heart will bode during the painful period of thy absence." "I will go, and return quickly," quoth Sancho. "In the mean time, good sir, cheer up, and remember the saying, that 'A good heart breaks bad luck;' and 'If there is no hook, there is no bacon;' and 'Where we least expect it, the hare starts:' this I say, because, though we could not find the castle or palace of my Lady Dulcinea in the dark, now that it is daylight I reckon I shall soon find it, and then—let me alone to deal with her." "Verily, Sancho," quoth Don Quixote, "thou dost apply thy proverbs most happily; yet Heaven grant me better luck in the attainment of my hopes!"

Sancho now switched his Dapple and set off, leaving Don Quixote on horseback, resting on his stirrups and leaning on his lance, full of melancholy and confused fancies, where we will leave him and attend Sancho Panza, who departed no less perplexed and thoughtful; insomuch that, after he had got out of the grove, and looked behind him to ascertain that his master was out of sight, he alighted, and, sitting down at the foot of a tree, he began to hold a parley with himself. "Tell me now, brother Sancho," quoth he, "whither is your worship going? Are you going to seek some ass that is lost?" "No verily." "Then what are you going to seek?" "Why I go to look for a thing of nothing—a princess, the sun of beauty, and all heaven together!" "Well, Sancho, and where think you to find all this?" "Where? In the great city of Toboso." "Very well; and pray who sent you on this errand?" "Why the renowned knight Don Quixote de la Mancha, who redresses wrongs, and gives drink to the hungry and meat to the thirsty." "All this is mighty well; and do you know her house, Sancho?" "My master says it must be some royal palace or stately castle." "And have you ever seen her?" "Neither I nor my master have ever seen her!—Well," continued he, "there is a remedy for every thing but death, who, in spite of our teeth, will have us in his clutches. This master of mine, I can plainly see, is mad enough for a strait waistcoat; and, in truth, I am not much better; nay, I am worse, in following and serving him, if there is any truth in the proverb, 'Shew me who thou art with, and I will tell thee what thou art;' or in the other, 'Not with whom thou wert bred, but with whom thou art fed.' He then being in truth a madman, and so mad as frequently to mistake one thing for another, and not know black from white; as plainly appeared when he called the windmills giants, mules dromedaries, and the flock of sheep armies of fighting men, with many more things to the same tune; this being the case, I say, it will not be very difficult to make him believe that a country girl (the first I light upon) is the Lady Dulcinea; and, should he not believe it, I will swear to it; and if he swears, I will outswear him; and if he persists, I will persist the more; so that mine shall still be uppermost, come what will of it. By this plan I may perhaps tire him of sending me on such errands; or he may take it into his head that some wicked enchanter has changed his lady's form, out of pure spite."

This project set Sancho's spirit at rest, and he reckoned his business as good as half done; so he stayed where he was till towards evening, that Don Quixote might suppose him travelling on his mission. Fortunately for him, just as he was going to mount his Dapple, he espied three country girls coming from Toboso, each mounted on a young ass. Sancho no sooner got sight of them than he rode back at a good pace to seek his master Don Quixote, whom he found breathing a thousand sighs and amorous lamentations. When Don Quixote saw him, he said, "Well, friend Sancho, am I to mark this day with a white or a black stone?" "Your worship," answered Sancho, "had better mark it with red ochre!" "Thou bringest me good news, then?" cried Don Quixote. "So good," answered Sancho, "that your worship has only to clap spurs to Rozinante, and get out upon the plain to see the lady Dulcinea del Toboso, who, with a couple of her damsels, is coming to pay your worship a visit." "Gracious Heaven!" exclaimed Don Quixote, "what dost thou say? Take care that thou beguilest not my real sorrow by a counterfeit joy." "What should I get," answered Sancho, "by deceiving your worship, only to be found out the next moment? Come, sir, put on, and you will see the princess, our mistress, all arrayed and adorned—in short, like herself. She and her damsels are one blaze of flaming gold; all strings of pearls, all diamonds, all rubies, all cloth of tissue above ten hands deep; their hair loose about their shoulders, like so many sunbeams blowing about in the wind; and, what is more, they come mounted upon three pyed belfreys, the finest you ever laid eyes on." "Palfreys, thou wouldst say, Sancho," quoth Don Quixote. "Well, well," answered Sancho, "belfreys and palfreys are much the same thing; but let them be mounted how they will, they are sure the finest creatures one would wish to see, especially my mistress the princess Dulcinea, who dazzles one's senses." "Let us go, son Sancho," answered Don Quixote; "and, as a reward for this welcome news, I bequeath to thee the choicest spoils I shall gain in my next adventure."

They were now got out of the wood, and saw the three girls very near. Don Quixote looked eagerly along the road towards Toboso, and, seeing nobody but the three girls, he asked Sancho, in much agitation, whether they were out of the city when he left them. "Out of the city!" answered Sancho; "are your worship's eyes in the nape of your neck, that you do not see them now before you, shining like the sun at noon-day?" "I see only three country girls," answered Don Quixote, "on three asses." "Now, keep me from mischief!" answered Sancho; "is it possible that three belfreys, or how do you call them, white as the driven snow, should look to you like asses? As I am alive, you shall pluck off this beard of mine if it be so." "I tell thee, friend Sancho," answered Don Quixote, "that it is as certain they are asses as that I am Don Quixote and thou Sancho Panza; at least so they seem to me." "Sir," quoth Sancho, "say not such a thing; but snuff those eyes of yours, and come and pay reverence to the mistress of your soul." So saying he advanced forward to meet the peasant girls; and, alighting from Dapple, he laid hold of one of their asses by the halter, and, bending both knees to the ground, said to the girl, "Queen, princess, and duchess of beauty, let your haughtiness and greatness be pleased to receive into your grace and good-liking your captive knight, who stands there turned into stone, all disorder and without any pulse, to find himself before your magnificent presence. I am Sancho Panza, his squire, and he is that wayworn knight Don Quixote de la Mancha, otherwise called the Knight of the Sorrowful Figure."

Don Quixote had now placed himself on his knees by Sancho, and with wild and staring eyes surveyed her whom Sancho called his queen; and seeing nothing but a peasant girl, with a broad face, flat nose, coarse and homely, he was so confounded that he could not open his lips. The girls were also surprised to find themselves stopped by two men so different in aspect, and both on their knees; but the lady who was stopped, breaking silence, said in an angry tone, "Get out of the road, plague on ye! and let us pass by, for we are in haste." "O princess and universal lady of Toboso!" cried Sancho, "is not your magnificent heart melting to see, on his knees before your sublimated presence, the pillar and prop of knight-errantry?" "Hey day! what's here to do?" cried another of the girls; "look how your small gentry come to jeer us poor country girls, as if we could not give them as good as they bring; go, get off about your business, and let us mind ours, and so speed you well." "Rise, Sancho," said Don Quixote, on hearing this; "for I now perceive that fortune, not yet satisfied with persecuting me, has barred every avenue whereby relief might come to this wretched soul I bear about me. And thou, O extreme of all that is valuable, summit of human perfection, thou sole balm to this disconsolate heart that adores thee, though now some wicked enchanter spreads clouds and cataracts over my eyes, changing, and to them only, thy peerless beauty into that of a poor rustic; if he has not converted mine also into that of some goblin, to render it horrible to thy view, bestow on me one kind look, and let this submissive posture, these bended knees, before thy disguised beauty, declare the humility with which my soul adores thee!" "Marry come up," quoth the girl, "with your idle gibberish! get on with you, and let us go, and we shall take it kindly." Sancho now let go the halter, delighted that he had come off so well with his contrivance. The imaginary Dulcinea was no sooner at liberty than, pricking her beast with a sharp-pointed stick which she held in her hand, she scoured along the field; but the ass, smarting more than usual under the goad, began to kick and wince in such a manner that down came the Lady Dulcinea to the ground. Don Quixote was proceeding to raise his enchanted mistress, but the lady saved him that trouble; for immediately upon getting up from the ground she retired three or four steps back, took a little run, then clapping both hands upon the ass's crupper, jumped into the saddle lighter than a falcon, and seated herself astride like a man. "By Saint Roque!" cried Sancho, "our lady mistress is lighter than a bird, and could teach the nimblest Cordovan or Mexican how to mount: she springs into the saddle at a jump, and without the help of spurs, makes her palfrey run like a wild ass; and her damsels are not a whit short of her, for they all fly like the wind!" And this was the truth; for Dulcinea being remounted, the other two made after her at full speed, without looking behind them, for above half a league.

Don Quixote followed them with his eyes as far as he was able; and when they were out of sight, turning to Sancho, he said, "What dost thou think now, Sancho? See how I am persecuted by enchanters! Mark how far their malice extends, even to depriving me of the pleasure of seeing my mistress in her own proper form! Surely I was born to be an example of wretchedness, and the butt and mark at which all the arrows of ill-fortune are aimed! And thou must have observed too, Sancho, that these traitors were not contented with changing and transforming the countenance of my Dulcinea, but they must give her the base and uncouth figure of a country wench. But tell me, Sancho, that which to me appeared to be a pannel, was it a side-saddle or a pillion?" "It was a side-saddle," answered Sancho, "with a field covering, worth half a kingdom for the richness of it." "And that I should not see all this!" exclaimed Don Quixote. "Again I say, and a thousand times will I repeat it, I am the most unfortunate of men!" The sly rogue Sancho had much difficulty to forbear laughing to think how finely his master was gulled. After more dialogue of the same kind, they mounted their beasts again, and followed the road to Saragossa, still intending to be present at a solemn festival annually held in that city. But before they reached it, events befell them which, for their importance, variety, and novelty, well deserve to be recorded and read.