The Junior Classics, Volume 4: Heroes and heroines of chivalry
General
The Junior Classics, Volume 4: Heroes and heroines of chivalry
Children's literature
They made a thing like a cage of timber, so big that Don Quixote might
sit or lie in it at his ease, and presently Don Fernando, Cardemo,
their companions, and the innkeeper did all, by master curate's
directions, cover their faces and disguise themselves as well as they
could, so that they might seem to Don Quixote to be different persons
to any he had seen in the castle. This being done, they entered
silently into the place where he slept, reposing after his recent
battles. They went up to him as he was sleeping peacefully, not
fearing any such accident, and, laying hold of him forcibly, they tied
his hands and feet very strongly, so that when he started out of his
sleep he could not move, nor do anything else but stare and wonder at
the strange faces that he saw before him.
And immediately he fell into the idea, which his wild imagination had
at once suggested to him, that all these strange figures were spirits
and phantoms of that enchanted castle, and he believed that he himself
was without doubt enchanted, seeing that he could neither move nor
defend himself.
All happened as the curate who plotted the jest expected; and after
they had brought him to the cage, they shut him within, and afterwards
nailed the bars thereof so well that they could not easily be broken.
Sancho all this time looked on in wonder to see what would happen to
his master.
Then the phantoms mounted him upon their shoulders, and as he was
carried out of his chamber door the barber called out in as terrible a
voice as he could muster: "O Knight of the Rueful Countenance, be not
grieved at thine imprisonment, for so it must be that thine adventures
be more speedily ended. And thou, O most noble and obedient squire
that ever had sword at girdle, beard on a face, or dent in a nose, let
it not dismay thee to see carried away thus the flower of all
knighthood. For I assure thee that all thy wages shall be paid to
thee, if thou wilt follow in the steps of this valorous and enchanted
knight. And as I am not allowed to say more, farewell!"
Don Quixote listened attentively to all this prophecy, and said: "O
thou, whatsoever thou beest, I desire thee to request in my name that
I may not perish in this prison before my work is ended. And as
concerns my squire Sancho Panza, I trust in his goodness that he will
not abandon me in good or bad fortune. For, though it should fall out
through his or my hard lot that I shall not be able to bestow on him
an island, as I have promised, his wages cannot be lost to him, for in
my will, which is made already, I have set down what he is to have for
his many good services."
Sancho Panza bowed his head with great reverence when he heard this,
and kissed both his master's hands, which were bound tightly together.
Then the phantoms lifted up the cage and hoisted it on to the wagon
that was drawn by the team of oxen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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