The Junior Classics, Volume 4: Heroes and heroines of chivalry
General
The Junior Classics, Volume 4: Heroes and heroines of chivalry
Children's literature
The only result of this was that it made him very sick indeed, as well
it might, and, what with the sickness and the bruising and the
weariness of body, he fell fast asleep for several hours, and at the
end of his sleep awoke so refreshed and so much the better of his
bruises that he took himself to be cured and verily believed he had
hit upon the balsam of Fierabras.
Sancho Panza, to whom his master's recovery seemed little short of a
miracle, begged that he might have what was left in the boiling-pot,
which was no small quantity. Don Quixote consenting, he took the pot
in both hands, and tossed it down, swallowing very little less than
his master had done.
It happened, however, that Sancho's stomach was not so delicate as his
master's and he suffered such terrible pains and misery before he was
sick that he thought his last hour was come, and cursed the balsam and
the thief who had given it to him.
Don Quixote, seeing him in this bad way, said: "I believe, Sancho,
that all this evil befalleth thee because thou art not dubbed knight,
for I am persuaded that this balsam may not benefit any one that is
not."
"If your worship knew that," replied poor Sancho "bad luck to me and
mine, why did you let me taste it?"
Before Don Quixote could reply to this, Sancho became so terribly sick
that he could only lie groaning and moaning for two hours, at the end
of which he felt so shaken and shattered that he could scarcely stand,
and sadly wished that he had never become squire to a knight-errant.
HOW SANCHO PAID THE RECKONING AT THE INN
Retold by Judge Parry
Now whilst Sancho Panza lay groaning in his bed, Don Quixote, who, as
we have said, felt somewhat eased and cured, made up his mind to set
off in search of new adventures. And full of this desire he himself
saddled Rozinante and put the pack-saddle on his squire's beast, and
helped Sancho to dress and to mount his ass. Then getting a-horseback
he rode over to the corner of the inn and seized hold of a pike which
stood there, to make it serve him instead of a lance.
All the people that were staying at the inn, some twenty in number,
stood staring at him, and among these was the innkeeper's
daughter. Don Quixote kept turning his eyes towards her and sighing
dolefully, which every one, or at least all who had seen him the night
before, thought must be caused by the pain he was in from his bruises.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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