Sancho came up, and when he saw the countenance of the bachelorCarrasco, he fell to crossing himself a thousand times, and blessinghimself as many more. All this time the prostrate knight showed nosigns of life, and Sancho said to Don Quixote, "It is my opinion,senor, that in any case your worship should take and thrust your swordinto the mouth of this one here that looks like the bachelor SamsonCarrasco; perhaps in him you will kill one of your enemies, theenchanters."
"Thy advice is not bad," said Don Quixote, "for of enemies the fewerthe better;" and he was drawing his sword to carry into effectSancho's counsel and suggestion, when the squire of the Mirrors cameup, now without the nose which had made him so hideous, and criedout in a loud voice, "Mind what you are about, Senor Don Quixote; thatis your friend, the bachelor Samson Carrasco, you have at your feet,and I am his squire."
"And the nose?" said Sancho, seeing him without the hideousfeature he had before; to which he replied, "I have it here in mypocket," and putting his hand into his right pocket, he pulled out amasquerade nose of varnished pasteboard of the make already described;and Sancho, examining him more and more closely, exclaimed aloud ina voice of amazement, "Holy Mary be good to me! Isn't it Tom Cecial,my neighbour and gossip?"
"Why, to be sure I am!" returned the now unnosed squire; "Tom CecialI am, gossip and friend Sancho Panza; and I'll tell you presentlythe means and tricks and falsehoods by which I have been brought here;but in the meantime, beg and entreat of your master not to touch,maltreat, wound, or slay the Knight of the Mirrors whom he has athis feet; because, beyond all dispute, it is the rash andill-advised bachelor Samson Carrasco, our fellow townsman."
At this moment he of the Mirrors came to himself, and Don Quixoteperceiving it, held the naked point of his sword over his face, andsaid to him, "You are a dead man, knight, unless you confess thatthe peerless Dulcinea del Toboso excels your Casildea de Vandalia inbeauty; and in addition to this you must promise, if you shouldsurvive this encounter and fall, to go to the city of El Toboso andpresent yourself before her on my behalf, that she deal with youaccording to her good pleasure; and if she leaves you free to doyours, you are in like manner to return and seek me out （for the trailof my mighty deeds will serve you as a guide to lead you to where Imay be）， and tell me what may have passed between you and her-conditions which, in accordance with what we stipulated before ourcombat, do not transgress the just limits of knight-errantry."
"I confess," said the fallen knight, "that the dirty tattered shoeof the lady Dulcinea del Toboso is better than the ill-combed thoughclean beard of Casildea; and I promise to go and to return from herpresence to yours, and to give you a full and particular account ofall you demand of me."
"You must also confess and believe," added Don Quixote, "that theknight you vanquished was not and could not be Don Quixote of LaMancha, but some one else in his likeness, just as I confess andbelieve that you, though you seem to be the bachelor SamsonCarrasco, are not so, but some other resembling him, whom my enemieshave here put before me in his shape, in order that I may restrain andmoderate the vehemence of my wrath, and make a gentle use of the gloryof my victory."
"I confess, hold, and think everything to be as you believe, hold,and think it," the crippled knight; "let me rise, I entreat you; if,indeed, the shock of my fall will allow me, for it has left me in asorry plight enough."
Don Quixote helped him to rise, with the assistance of his squireTom Cecial; from whom Sancho never took his eyes, and to whom he putquestions, the replies to which furnished clear proof that he wasreally and truly the Tom Cecial he said; but the impression made onSancho's mind by what his master said about the enchanters havingchanged the face of the Knight of the Mirrors into that of thebachelor Samson Carrasco, would not permit him to believe what hesaw with his eyes. In fine, both master and man remained under thedelusion; and, down in the mouth, and out of luck, he of the Mirrorsand his squire parted from Don Quixote and Sancho, he meaning to golook for some village where he could plaster and strap his ribs. DonQuixote and Sancho resumed their journey to Saragossa, and on it thehistory leaves them in order that it may tell who the Knight of theMirrors and his long-nosed squire were.
CHAPTER XV
WHEREIN IT IS TOLD AND KNOWN WHO THE KNIGHT OF THE MIRRORS AND HISSQUIRE WERE
DON QUIXOTE went off satisfied, elated, and vain-glorious in thehighest degree at having won a victory over such a valiant knight ashe fancied him of the Mirrors to be, and one from whose knightlyword he expected to learn whether the enchantment of his lady stillcontinued; inasmuch as the said vanquished knight was bound, under thepenalty of ceasing to be one, to return and render him an account ofwhat took place between him and her. But Don Quixote was of onemind, he of the Mirrors of another, for he just then had no thought ofanything but finding some village where he could plaster himself, ashas been said already. The history goes on to say, then, that when thebachelor Samson Carrasco recommended Don Quixote to resume hisknight-errantry which he had laid aside, it was in consequence ofhaving been previously in conclave with the curate and the barber onthe means to be adopted to induce Don Quixote to stay at home in peaceand quiet without worrying himself with his ill-starred adventures; atwhich consultation it was decided by the unanimous vote of all, and onthe special advice of Carrasco, that Don Quixote should be allowedto go, as it seemed impossible to restrain him, and that Samson shouldsally forth to meet him as a knight-errant, and do battle with him,for there would be no difficulty about a cause, and vanquish him, thatbeing looked upon as an easy matter; and that it should be agreedand settled that the vanquished was to be at the mercy of thevictor. Then, Don Quixote being vanquished, the bachelor knight was tocommand him to return to his village and his house, and not quit itfor two years, or until he received further orders from him; all whichit was clear Don Quixote would unhesitatingly obey, rather thancontravene or fail to observe the laws of chivalry; and during theperiod of his seclusion he might perhaps forget his folly, or theremight be an opportunity of discovering some ready remedy for hismadness. Carrasco undertook the task, and Tom Cecial, a gossip andneighbour of Sancho Panza's, a lively, feather-headed fellow,offered himself as his squire. Carrasco armed himself in the fashiondescribed, and Tom Cecial, that he might not be known by his gossipwhen they met, fitted on over his own natural nose the falsemasquerade one that has been mentioned; and so they followed thesame route Don Quixote took, and almost came up with him in time to bepresent at the adventure of the cart of Death and finallyencountered them in the grove, where all that the sagacious reader hasbeen reading about took place; and had it not been for theextraordinary fancies of Don Quixote, and his conviction that thebachelor was not the bachelor, senor bachelor would have beenincapacitated for ever from taking his degree of licentiate, allthrough not finding nests where he thought to find birds.
Tom Cecial, seeing how ill they had succeeded, and what a sorryend their expedition had come to, said to the bachelor, "Sureenough, Senor Samson Carrasco, we are served right; it is easyenough to plan and set about an enterprise, but it is often adifficult matter to come well out of it. Don Quixote a madman, andwe sane; he goes off laughing, safe, and sound, and you are leftsore and sorry! I'd like to know now which is the madder, he who is sobecause he cannot help it, or he who is so of his own choice?"
To which Samson replied, "The difference between the two sorts ofmadmen is, that he who is so will he nil he, will be one always, whilehe who is so of his own accord can leave off being one whenever helikes."
"In that case," said Tom Cecial, "I was a madman of my own accordwhen I volunteered to become your squire, and, of my own accord,I'll leave off being one and go home."
"That's your affair," returned Samson, "but to suppose that I amgoing home until I have given Don Quixote a thrashing is absurd; andit is not any wish that he may recover his senses that will make mehunt him out now, but a wish for the sore pain I am in with my ribswon't let me entertain more charitable thoughts."
Thus discoursing, the pair proceeded until they reached a town whereit was their good luck to find a bone-setter, with whose help theunfortunate Samson was cured. Tom Cecial left him and went home, whilehe stayed behind meditating vengeance; and the history will returnto him again at the proper time, so as not to omit making merry withDon Quixote now.
CHAPTER XVI
OF WHAT BEFELL DON QUIXOTE WITH A DISCREET GENTLEMAN OF LA MANCHA
DON QUIXOTE pursued his journey in the high spirits, satisfaction,and self-complacency already described, fancying himself the mostvalorous knight-errant of the age in the world because of his latevictory. All the adventures that could befall him from that time forthhe regarded as already done and brought to a happy issue; he madelight of enchantments and enchanters; he thought no more of thecountless drubbings that had been administered to him in the course ofhis knight-errantry, nor of the volley of stones that had levelledhalf his teeth, nor of the ingratitude of the galley slaves, nor ofthe audacity of the Yanguesans and the shower of stakes that fell uponhim; in short, he said to himself that could he discover any means,mode, or way of disenchanting his lady Dulcinea, he would not envy thehighest fortune that the most fortunate knight-errant of yore everreached or could reach.