Galatea

by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

'I know not, friend Lauso, if I should congratulate you on the bliss attained in such brief hours, for I fear that it cannot be as firm and sure as you imagine; but nevertheless I am glad that you enjoy, though it may be for a little while, the pleasure that freedom when attained causes in the soul, since it might be that knowing now how it should be valued, though you might turn again to the broken chains and bonds, you would use more force to break them, drawn by the sweetness and delight a free understanding and an unimpassioned will enjoy.'

'Have no fear, discreet Thyrsis,' replied Lauso, 'that any other new artifice may suffice for me to place once more my feet in the stocks of love, nor count me so light and capricious but that it has cost me, to set me in the state in which I am, countless reflections, a thousand verified suspicions, a thousand fulfilled promises made to Heaven, that I might return to the light I had lost; and since in the light I now see how little I saw before, I will strive to preserve it in the best way I can.'

'There will be no other way so good,' said Thyrsis, 'as not to turn to look at what you leave behind, for you will lose, if you turn, the freedom that has cost you so much, and you will be left, as was left that heedless lover, with new causes for ceaseless lament; and be assured, friend Lauso, that there is not in the world a breast so loving, which disdain and needless arrogance do not cool, and even cause to withdraw from its ill-placed thoughts. And I am made to believe this truth the more, knowing who Silena is, though you have never told it me, and knowing also her fickle mood, her hasty impulses, and the freedom, to give it no other name, of her inclinations, things which, if she did not temper them and cloak them with the peerless beauty wherewith Heaven has endowed her, would have made her abhorred by all the world.'

'You speak truth, Thyrsis,' replied Lauso, 'for without any doubt her remarkable beauty, and the appearances of incomparable modesty wherewith she arrays herself are reasons why she should be not only loved but adored by all that behold her. And so no one should marvel that my free will has submitted to enemies so strong and mighty; only it is right that one should marvel at the way I have been able to escape from them, for though I come from their hands so ill-treated, with will impaired, understanding disturbed, and memory decayed, yet it seems to me that I can conquer in the strife.'

The two shepherds did not proceed further in their discourse, for at this moment they saw a fair shepherdess coming by the very road they were going, and a little way from her a shepherd, who was straightway recognised, for he was the old Arsindo, and the shepherdess was Galercio's sister, Maurisa. And when she was recognised by Galatea and Florisa, they understood that she was coming with some message from Grisaldo to Rosaura, and as the pair went forward to welcome her, Maurisa came to embrace Galatea, and the old Arsindo greeted all the shepherds, and embraced his friend Lauso, who had a great desire to know what Arsindo had done after they told him that he had gone off in pursuit of Maurisa. And when he was now seen coming back with her, he straightway began to lose with him and with all the character his white hairs had won for him, and he would even have lost it altogether, had not those who were there known so well from experience to what point and how far the force of love extended, and so in the very ones who blamed him he found excuses for his error. And it seems that Arsindo, guessing what the shepherds guessed of him, as though to satisfy and excuse his affection, said to them:

'Listen, shepherds, to one of the strangest love-affairs that for many years can have been seen on these our banks, or on others. I believe full well that you know, and we all know, the renowned shepherd Lenio, him whose loveless disposition won him the name of loveless, him who not many days ago, merely to speak ill of love, dared to enter into rivalry with the famous Thyrsis, who is present; him, I say, who never could move his tongue, were it not to speak ill of love; him who with such earnestness was wont to reprove those whom he saw distressed by the pangs of love. He, then, being so open an enemy of Love, has come to the pass that I am sure Love has no one who follows him more earnestly, nor yet has he a vassal whom he persecutes more, for he has made him fall in love with the loveless Gelasia, that cruel shepherdess, who the other day, as you saw, held the brother of this damsel' (pointing to Maurisa), 'who resembles her so closely in disposition, with the rope at his throat, to finish at the hands of her cruelty his short and ill-starred days. I say in a word, shepherds, that Lenio the loveless is dying for the hard-hearted Gelasia, and for her he fills the air with sighs and the earth with tears; and what is worse in this is that it seems to me that Love has wished to avenge himself on Lenio's rebellious heart, handing him over to the hardest and most scornful shepherdess that has been seen; and he knowing it, now seeks in all he says and does to reconcile himself with Love; and in the same terms with which before he abused him, he now exalts and honours him. And nevertheless, neither is Love moved to favour him, nor Gelasia inclined to heal him, as I have seen with my eyes; since, not many hours ago, as I was coming in the company of this shepherdess, we found him at the spring of slates stretched on the ground, his face covered with a cold sweat, and his breast panting with strange rapidity. I went up to him and recognised him, and with the water of the spring sprinkled his face, whereat he recovered his lost senses; and drawing close to him I asked him the cause of his grief, which he told me without missing a word, telling it me with such tender feeling, that he inspired it in this shepherdess, in whom I think there never was contained the sign of any compassion. He dwelt on Gelasia's cruelty, and the love he had for her, and the suspicion that reigned in him that Love had brought him to such a state to avenge himself at one blow for the many wrongs he had done him. I consoled him as best I could, and leaving him free from his past paroxysm, I come accompanying this shepherdess, and to seek you, Lauso, in order that, if you would be willing, we may return to our huts, for it is ten days since we left them, and it may be that our herds feel our absence more than we do theirs.'

'I know not if I should tell you in reply, Arsindo,' replied Lauso, 'that I believe you invite me rather out of compliment than for anything else to return to our huts, having as much to do in those of others, as your ten days' absence from me has shown. But leaving on one side most of what I could say to you thereon for a better time and opportunity, tell me again if it is true what you say of Lenio; for if it is, I may declare that Love has wrought in these days two of the greatest miracles he has wrought in all the days of his life, namely, to subdue and enslave Lenio's hard heart, and to set free mine which was so subjected.'

'Look to what you are saying, friend Lauso,' then said Orompo, 'for if Love held you subject, as you have indicated hitherto, how has the same Love now set you in the freedom you proclaim?'

'If you would understand me, Orompo,' replied Lauso, 'you will see that I in no wise contradict myself, for I say, or mean to say, that the love that reigned and reigns in the breast of her whom I loved so dearly, as it directs itself to a purpose different from mine, though it is all love,—the effect it has wrought in me is to place me in freedom and Lenio in slavery; and do not compel me, Orompo, to relate other miracles with these.'