"So far all goes well," said Don Quixote; "but tell me what jewel was it
that she gave thee on taking thy leave, in return for thy tidings of me?
For it is a usual and ancient custom with knights and ladies errant to
give the squires, damsels, or dwarfs who bring tidings of their ladies to
the knights, or of their knights to the ladies, some rich jewel as a
guerdon for good news,' and acknowledgment of the message."
"That is very likely," said Sancho, "and a good custom it was, to my
mind; but that must have been in days gone by, for now it would seem to
be the custom only to give a piece of bread and cheese; because that was
what my lady Dulcinea gave me over the top of the yard-wall when I took
leave of her; and more by token it was sheep's-milk cheese."
"She is generous in the extreme," said Don Quixote, "and if she did not
give thee a jewel of gold, no doubt it must have been because she had not
one to hand there to give thee; but sleeves are good after Easter; I
shall see her and all shall be made right. But knowest thou what amazes
me, Sancho? It seems to me thou must have gone and come through the air,
for thou hast taken but little more than three days to go to El Toboso
and return, though it is more than thirty leagues from here to there.
From which I am inclined to think that the sage magician who is my
friend, and watches over my interests (for of necessity there is and must
be one, or else I should not be a right knight-errant), that this same, I
say, must have helped thee to travel without thy knowledge; for some of
these sages will catch up a knight-errant sleeping in his bed, and
without his knowing how or in what way it happened, he wakes up the next
day more than a thousand leagues away from the place where he went to
sleep. And if it were not for this, knights-errant would not be able to
give aid to one another in peril, as they do at every turn. For a knight,
maybe, is fighting in the mountains of Armenia with some dragon, or
fierce serpent, or another knight, and gets the worst of the battle, and
is at the point of death; but when he least looks for it, there appears
over against him on a cloud, or chariot of fire, another knight, a friend
of his, who just before had been in England, and who takes his part, and
delivers him from death; and at night he finds himself in his own
quarters supping very much to his satisfaction; and yet from one place to
the other will have been two or three thousand leagues. And all this is
done by the craft and skill of the sage enchanters who take care of those
valiant knights; so that, friend Sancho, I find no difficulty in
believing that thou mayest have gone from this place to El Toboso and
returned in such a short time, since, as I have said, some friendly sage
must have carried thee through the air without thee perceiving it."