Don Quixote - Part I - Page 145/400

"As my fate has so willed it," said the bachelor, "I entreat you, sir

knight-errant, whose errand has been such an evil one for me, to help me

to get from under this mule that holds one of my legs caught between the

stirrup and the saddle."

"I would have talked on till to-morrow," said Don Quixote; "how long were

you going to wait before telling me of your distress?"

He at once called to Sancho, who, however, had no mind to come, as he was

just then engaged in unloading a sumpter mule, well laden with provender,

which these worthy gentlemen had brought with them. Sancho made a bag of

his coat, and, getting together as much as he could, and as the bag would

hold, he loaded his beast, and then hastened to obey his master's call,

and helped him to remove the bachelor from under the mule; then putting

him on her back he gave him the torch, and Don Quixote bade him follow

the track of his companions, and beg pardon of them on his part for the

wrong which he could not help doing them.

And said Sancho, "If by chance these gentlemen should want to know who

was the hero that served them so, your worship may tell them that he is

the famous Don Quixote of La Mancha, otherwise called the Knight of the

Rueful Countenance."

The bachelor then took his departure.

I forgot to mention that before he did so he said to Don Quixote,

"Remember that you stand excommunicated for having laid violent hands on

a holy thing, juxta illud, si quis, suadente diabolo."

"I do not understand that Latin," answered Don Quixote, "but I know well

I did not lay hands, only this pike; besides, I did not think I was

committing an assault upon priests or things of the Church, which, like a

Catholic and faithful Christian as I am, I respect and revere, but upon

phantoms and spectres of the other world; but even so, I remember how it

fared with Cid Ruy Diaz when he broke the chair of the ambassador of that

king before his Holiness the Pope, who excommunicated him for the same;

and yet the good Roderick of Vivar bore himself that day like a very

noble and valiant knight."

On hearing this the bachelor took his departure, as has been said,

without making any reply; and Don Quixote asked Sancho what had induced

him to call him the "Knight of the Rueful Countenance" more then than at

any other time.

"I will tell you," answered Sancho; "it was because I have been looking

at you for some time by the light of the torch held by that unfortunate,

and verily your worship has got of late the most ill-favoured countenance

I ever saw: it must be either owing to the fatigue of this combat, or

else to the want of teeth and grinders."