IN WHICH IS RELATED THE ADVENTURE OF THE ENAMOURED SHEPHERD, TOGETHER
WITH OTHER TRULY DROLL INCIDENTS
Don Quixote had gone but a short distance beyond Don Diego's village,
when he fell in with a couple of either priests or students, and a couple
of peasants, mounted on four beasts of the ass kind. One of the students
carried, wrapped up in a piece of green buckram by way of a portmanteau,
what seemed to be a little linen and a couple of pairs of-ribbed
stockings; the other carried nothing but a pair of new fencing-foils with
buttons. The peasants carried divers articles that showed they were on
their way from some large town where they had bought them, and were
taking them home to their village; and both students and peasants were
struck with the same amazement that everybody felt who saw Don Quixote
for the first time, and were dying to know who this man, so different
from ordinary men, could be. Don Quixote saluted them, and after
ascertaining that their road was the same as his, made them an offer of
his company, and begged them to slacken their pace, as their young asses
travelled faster than his horse; and then, to gratify them, he told them
in a few words who he was and the calling and profession he followed,
which was that of a knight-errant seeking adventures in all parts of the
world. He informed them that his own name was Don Quixote of La Mancha,
and that he was called, by way of surname, the Knight of the Lions.
All this was Greek or gibberish to the peasants, but not so to the
students, who very soon perceived the crack in Don Quixote's pate; for
all that, however, they regarded him with admiration and respect, and one
of them said to him, "If you, sir knight, have no fixed road, as it is
the way with those who seek adventures not to have any, let your worship
come with us; you will see one of the finest and richest weddings that up
to this day have ever been celebrated in La Mancha, or for many a league
round."
Don Quixote asked him if it was some prince's, that he spoke of it in
this way. "Not at all," said the student; "it is the wedding of a farmer
and a farmer's daughter, he the richest in all this country, and she the
fairest mortal ever set eyes on. The display with which it is to be
attended will be something rare and out of the common, for it will be
celebrated in a meadow adjoining the town of the bride, who is called,
par excellence, Quiteria the fair, as the bridegroom is called Camacho
the rich. She is eighteen, and he twenty-two, and they are fairly
matched, though some knowing ones, who have all the pedigrees in the
world by heart, will have it that the family of the fair Quiteria is
better than Camacho's; but no one minds that now-a-days, for wealth can
solder a great many flaws. At any rate, Camacho is free-handed, and it is
his fancy to screen the whole meadow with boughs and cover it in
overhead, so that the sun will have hard work if he tries to get in to
reach the grass that covers the soil. He has provided dancers too, not
only sword but also bell-dancers, for in his own town there are those who
ring the changes and jingle the bells to perfection; of shoe-dancers I
say nothing, for of them he has engaged a host. But none of these things,
nor of the many others I have omitted to mention, will do more to make
this a memorable wedding than the part which I suspect the despairing
Basilio will play in it. This Basilio is a youth of the same village as
Quiteria, and he lived in the house next door to that of her parents, of
which circumstance Love took advantage to reproduce to the word the
long-forgotten loves of Pyramus and Thisbe; for Basilio loved Quiteria
from his earliest years, and she responded to his passion with countless
modest proofs of affection, so that the loves of the two children,
Basilio and Quiteria, were the talk and the amusement of the town. As
they grew up, the father of Quiteria made up his mind to refuse Basilio
his wonted freedom of access to the house, and to relieve himself of
constant doubts and suspicions, he arranged a match for his daughter with
the rich Camacho, as he did not approve of marrying her to Basilio, who
had not so large a share of the gifts of fortune as of nature; for if the
truth be told ungrudgingly, he is the most agile youth we know, a mighty
thrower of the bar, a first-rate wrestler, and a great ball-player; he
runs like a deer, and leaps better than a goat, bowls over the nine-pins
as if by magic, sings like a lark, plays the guitar so as to make it
speak, and, above all, handles a sword as well as the best."