The puppet-player's lamentations moving Sancho's pity, "Come," quoth he, "don't cry, Master Peter, thou breakest my heart to hear thee take on so; don't be cast down, man, for my master's a better Christian, I am sure, than to let any poor man come to loss by him; when he comes to know he has done you wrong, he will pay you for every farthing of damage, I will engage." "Truly," said Master Peter, "if his worship would but pay me for the puppets he has spoiled, I will ask no more, and he will discharge his conscience; for he that wrongs his neighbour, and does not make restitution, can never hope to be saved, that is certain." "I grant it," said Don Quixote; "but I am not sensible how I have in the least injured you, good Master Peter!" "How, sir! not injured me?" cried Master Peter. "Why, these poor relics that lie here on the cold ground cry out for vengeance against you. Was it not the invincible force of that powerful arm of yours that has scattered and dismembered them so? And whose were those bodies, sir, but mine? and by whom was I maintained but by them?"
"Well," said Don Quixote, "now I am thoroughly convinced of a truth which I have had reason to believe before, that those cursed magicians that daily persecute me, do nothing but delude me, first drawing me into dangerous adventures by the appearances of them as really they are, and then presently after changing the face of things as they please. Really and truly, gentlemen, I vow and protest before you all that hear me, that all that was acted here seemed to be really transacted ipso facto as it appeared. To me Melisandra appeared to be Melisandra, Don Gayferos was Don Gayferos, Marsilius Marsilius, and Charlemagne was the real Charlemagne. Which being so, I could not contain my fury, and acted according to the duties of my function, which obliges me to take the injured side. Now, though what I have done proves to be quite contrary to my good design, the fault ought not to be imputed to me, but to my persecuting foes; yet I own myself sorry for the mischance, and will myself pay the costs. Let Master Peter see what he must have for the figures, and I will pay it him now in good and lawful money." "Heaven bless your worship," cried Master Peter with a profound cringe, "I could expect no less from the wonderful Christianity of the valorous Don Quixote de la Mancha, the sure relief and bulwark of all miserable wanderers. Now let my landlord and the great Sancho be mediators and appraisers between your worship and myself, and I will stand to their award."
They agreed: and presently Master Peter taking up Marsilius, king of Saragosa, that lay by on the ground with his head off: "You see, gentlemen," said he, "it is impossible to restore this king to his former dignity; and therefore, with submission to your better judgments, I think that for his destruction, and to get him a successor, seven and twenty pence is little enough on conscience." "Proceed," said Don Quixote. "Then for this that is cleft in two," said Master Peter, taking up the Emperor Charlemagne, "I think he is richly worth one and thirty pence halfpenny." "Not so richly neither," quoth Sancho. "Truly," said the innkeeper, "I think it is pretty reasonable, but we will make it even money; let the poor fellow have half a crown." "Come," said Don Quixote, "let him have his full price; we will not stand haggling for so small a matter in a case like this: so make haste, Master Peter, for it is near supper-time, and I have some strong presumptions that I shall eat heartily." "Now," said Master Peter, "for this figure here that is without a nose and blind with one eye, being the fair Melisandra, I will be reasonable with you; give me fourteen pence; I would not take less from my brother."
In this manner he went on, setting his price upon the dead and wounded, which the arbitrators moderated to the content of both parties; and the whole sum amounted to forty reals and three quarters, which Sancho paid him down; and then Master Peter demanded two reals more for the trouble of catching his ape. "Give it him," said Don Quixote, "and set the monkey to catch the ape; and now would I give two hundred more to be assured that Don Gayferos and the Lady Melisandra were safely arrived in France among their friends." "Nobody can better tell than my ape," said Master Peter; "though who will catch him I know not, if hunger, or his kindness for me do not bring us together again to-night. However, to-morrow will be a new day; and when it is light we will see what is to be done."
The whole disturbance being appeased, to supper they went lovingly together; and Don Quixote treated the whole company, for he was liberality itself. Before day, the man with the lances and halberts left the inn, and some time after the scholar and the page came to take leave of the knight; the first to return home, and the second to continue his journey, towards whose charges Don Quixote gave him twelve reals. As for Master Peter, he knew too much of the knight's humour to desire to have any thing to do with him; and therefore, having picked up the ruins of the puppet-show, and got his ape again, by break of day he packed off to seek his fortune. The innkeeper, who did not know Don Quixote, was as much surprised at his liberality as at his madness. In fine, Sancho paid him very honestly by his master's order, and mounting a little before eight o'clock they left the inn, and proceeded on their journey; during which some other matters occurred, a knowledge of which is very requisite for the better understanding of this famous history.
CHAPTER LIX.
Wherein is shewn Don Quixote's ill success in the braying adventure, which did not end so happily as he desired and expected.
After Don Quixote had left the inn, he resolved to take a sight of the river Ebro, and the country about it, before he went to Saragosa, since he was not straitened for time; but might do that, and yet arrive soon enough to make one at the jousts and tournaments in that city. Two days he travelled without meeting with any thing worth his notice or the reader's; when on the third, as he was riding up a hill, he heard a great noise of drums, trumpets, and guns. At first he thought that some regiment of soldiers was on its march that way, which made him spur up Rozinante to the brow of the hill, that he might see them pass by; and then he saw in a bottom above two hundred men, as near as he could guess, armed with various weapons, as lances, cross-bows, partisans, halberts, pikes, some few firelocks, and a great many targets. Thereupon he descended into the vale, and made his approaches towards the battalion so near as to be able to distinguish their banners and observe their devices; more especially one that was to be seen on a standard of white satin, on which was represented to the life a little jackass, much like a Sardinian ass-colt, holding up his head, stretching out his neck, and thrusting out his tongue, in the very posture of an ass that is braying, with this distich written in fair characters about it:
"'Twas something more than nothing which one day
Made one and t'other worthy bailiff bray."