• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Don Quixote turned to look, and he saw that it was true; he was overjoyed, thinking, no doubt, that these were two armies coming to attack and fight each other in the middle of that broad plain. Because at all times and at every moment his fantasy was filled with the battles, enchantments, feats, follies, loves, and challenges recounted in books of chivalry, and everything he said, thought, or did was directed toward such matters. The dust clouds he saw had been raised by two large flocks of ewes and rams traveling along the same road from opposite directions, which could not be seen through the dust until they were very close. But Don Quixote insisted so fervently they were armies that Sancho believed him and said:

“Señor, then what should we do?”

“Do?” said Don Quixote. “Defend and protect the needy and helpless. You must know, Sancho, that the army in front of us is led and directed by the great Emperor Alifanfarón, lord of the great Ínsula Trapobane;2 the other, marching behind us, belongs to his enemy, the king of the Garamantes, Pentapolín of the Tucked-up Sleeve, so-called because he always enters into battle with a bare right arm.”

“Why do these two gentlemen hate each other so much?” asked Sancho.

“They hate each other,” responded Don Quixote, “because this Alifanfarón, a fierce pagan, is in love with Pentapolín’s daughter, an exceedingly beauteous and charming lady, and a Christian, whose father does not wish to give her to the pagan king unless he first renounces the law of his false prophet Mohammed and turns to her faith.”

“By my beard,” said Sancho, “Pentapolín is doing just the right thing, and I’m bound to help him any way I can!”

“In this you would be doing just as you should, Sancho,” said Don Quixote, “because to enter into battles such as these it is not required to be dubbed a knight.”

“That’s good enough for me,” responded Sancho, “but where will we put this donkey so we’re sure to find him when the fight’s over? Because I don’t believe that riding into battle on this kind of animal has been the custom up to now.”

“That is true,” said Don Quixote. “What you can do is let him find his own adventures, regardless of whether he is lost or not, because we shall have so many horses when we emerge victorious that even Rocinante runs the risk of being exchanged for another. But listen to me, and look, for I want to name for you the most eminent knights riding in these two armies. And so that you may see and mark them more clearly, let us withdraw to that hillock, where we should be able to perceive both armies.”

This they did, riding to the top of a hill from which there would have been a clear view of the two flocks that Don Quixote took for armies if the clouds of dust they raised had not confused and blurred the sight of anyone looking at them, but despite this, in his imagination he saw what he did not see and what was not there, and in a loud voice he began to say:

“That knight you see there in the gold-colored armor, who bears on his shield a crowned lion kneeling at the feet of a damsel, is the valiant Laurcalco,3 lord of the Bridge of Silver; the other in armor with flowers of gold, who bears on his shield three crowns of silver on a blue field, is the redoubtable Micocolembo, grand duke of Quirocia; the one on his right with the gigantic limbs is the never fearful Brandabarbarán de Boliche, lord of the three Arabias, whose armor is a snakeskin and whose shield is a door rumored to be one of those from the temple demolished by Samson when, with his death, he wreaked vengeance on his enemies. Now turn your eyes in the other direction, and you will see in front of and at the head of the other army the ever victorious and never defeated Timonel of Carcajona, prince of Nueva Vizcaya, who wears his armor quartered—blue, green, white, and yellow—and who bears on his shield a cat of gold on a tawny field, with a legend that reads: Meow, which is the beginning of the name of his lady who, they say, is the peerless Miulina, daughter of Duke Alfeñiquén of