Sancho, listening to all this, said to himself, "This master of mine,
when I say anything that has weight and substance, says I might take a
pulpit in hand, and go about the world preaching fine sermons; but I say
of him that, when he begins stringing maxims together and giving advice
not only might he take a pulpit in hand, but two on each finger, and go
into the market-places to his heart's content. Devil take you for a
knight-errant, what a lot of things you know! I used to think in my heart
that the only thing he knew was what belonged to his chivalry; but there
is nothing he won't have a finger in."
Sancho muttered this somewhat aloud, and his master overheard him, and
asked, "What art thou muttering there, Sancho?"
"I'm not saying anything or muttering anything," said Sancho; "I was only
saying to myself that I wish I had heard what your worship has said just
now before I married; perhaps I'd say now, 'The ox that's loose licks
himself well.'"
"Is thy Teresa so bad then, Sancho?"
"She is not very bad," replied Sancho; "but she is not very good; at
least she is not as good as I could wish."
"Thou dost wrong, Sancho," said Don Quixote, "to speak ill of thy wife;
for after all she is the mother of thy children." "We are quits,"
returned Sancho; "for she speaks ill of me whenever she takes it into her
head, especially when she is jealous; and Satan himself could not put up
with her then."
In fine, they remained three days with the newly married couple, by whom
they were entertained and treated like kings. Don Quixote begged the
fencing licentiate to find him a guide to show him the way to the cave of
Montesinos, as he had a great desire to enter it and see with his own
eyes if the wonderful tales that were told of it all over the country
were true. The licentiate said he would get him a cousin of his own, a
famous scholar, and one very much given to reading books of chivalry, who
would have great pleasure in conducting him to the mouth of the very
cave, and would show him the lakes of Ruidera, which were likewise famous
all over La Mancha, and even all over Spain; and he assured him he would
find him entertaining, for he was a youth who could write books good
enough to be printed and dedicated to princes. The cousin arrived at
last, leading an ass in foal, with a pack-saddle covered with a
parti-coloured carpet or sackcloth; Sancho saddled Rocinante, got Dapple
ready, and stocked his alforjas, along with which went those of the
cousin, likewise well filled; and so, commending themselves to God and
bidding farewell to all, they set out, taking the road for the famous
cave of Montesinos.