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“It’s a great virtue,” Sancho responded, “to know those plants, for I’m thinking that one day we’ll need to use that knowledge.”

He took out the things he said he was carrying, and they ate in peace and good companionship. But they wanted to find a place to sleep that night, and they quickly finished their dry and meager meal. Then they climbed back on their mounts and hurried to reach a village before dark, but the sun set, along with the hope of achieving their desire, when they were near the huts of some goatherds, and so they decided to spend the night there; as much as it grieved Sancho not to be in a town, it pleased his master to sleep outdoors, for it seemed to him that each time this occurred it was another act of certification that helped to prove his claim to knighthood.

CHAPTER XI

Regarding what befell Don Quixote with some goatherds

He was welcomed cheerfully by the goatherds, and Sancho, having done his best to tend to Rocinante and his donkey, followed the aroma coming from certain pieces of dried goat meat that were bubbling over the fire in a pot, and though he wished at that very moment to test if they were ready to be transferred from the pot to his stomach, he did not, because the goatherds removed them from the fire, spread some sheepskins on the ground, quickly prepared their rustic table, and with displays of goodwill invited them both to share what they had. The six of them, which was the number in their flock, sat down around the skins, having first with artless ceremony asked Don Quixote to sit on a small wooden trough that they turned upside down and set out for him. Don Quixote sat down, and Sancho remained standing to serve him and fill his cup, which was made of horn. His master saw him standing and said:

“So that you may see, Sancho, the virtue contained in knight errantry, and how those who practice any portion of it always tend to be honored and esteemed in the world, I want you to sit here at my side and in the company of these good people, and be the same as I, who am your natural lord and master; eat from my plate and drink where I drink, for one may say of knight errantry what is said of love: it makes all things equal.”

“You’re too kind!” said Sancho. “But I can tell your grace that as long as I have something good to eat, I’ll eat it just as well or better standing and all alone as sitting at the height of an emperor. Besides, if truth be told, what I eat, even if it’s bread and onion, tastes much better to me in my corner without fancy or respectful manners, than a turkey would at other tables where I have to chew slowly, not drink too much, wipe my mouth a lot, not sneeze or cough if I feel like it, or do other things that come with solitude and freedom. And so, Señor, these honors that your grace wants to grant me for being a servant and follower of knight errantry, which I am, being your grace’s squire, you should turn into other things that will be of greater comfort and benefit to me; these, though I am grateful for them, I renounce now and forever.”

“Despite all that, you will sit down, for God exalts the man who humbles himself.”

And seizing him by the arm, he obliged Sancho to sit next to him.

The goatherds did not understand their nonsensical talk about squires and knights errant, and they simply ate and were silent and looked at their guests, who, with a good deal of grace and eagerness, devoured pieces of goat meat as big as their fists. When the meat course was over, the goatherds spread out on the unshorn sheepskins a great quantity of dried acorns, along with half a cheese that was harder than mortar. In all this time the horn was not idle, for it made the rounds so often—sometimes full, sometimes empty, like the bucket at a well—that one of the two wineskins in evidence was emptied with no difficulty. After Don Quixote had satisfied his stomach, he picked up a handful of acorns, and, regarding them attentively, he began to speak these words:

“Fortunate the