With this view he turned Rozinante towards his own village, who, knowing that he was on his way home, began to trot along with so good a will that he seemed not to touch the ground.
He had not travelled far when he heard from a thicket hard by the shrill cries of some weak and delicate mortal in grievous distress.
No sooner did he hear them than he exclaimed: 'I am indeed thankful for the favour done to me by giving me so soon an opportunity of performing what is due to my profession, and gathering the fruits of my desires. These cries doubtless come from some distressed man or woman who has need of my protection and aid.'
Then turning the reins, he guided Rozinante towards the place whence the voice seemed to proceed. And within a few paces after he had entered into the thicket, he saw a mare tied up to one oak, and to another was tied a youth, all naked from the middle upward, of about fifteen years of age. Now it was he that cried so pitifully, and not without cause. For a sturdy fellow of a farmer was beating him soundly with a girdle, accompanying each stroke with a reproof and piece of advice, saying: 'The tongue must peace and the eyes be wary.' And the boy, whose name was Andrew, answered: 'I will never do it again, good master, I will never do it again. I promise to have more care of your things from henceforth.'
Seeing what passed, Don Quixote cried out with an angry voice: 'Ill it beseems you, discourteous Knight, to deal thus with one that cannot defend himself. Mount, therefore, on horseback and take thy lance (for the Farmer had a lance leaning against the very same tree to which his mare was tied), for I will make thee know that it is the act of a coward to do that which thou dost.'
The Farmer, beholding this strange figure buckled in armour, and brandishing a lance over his head, gave himself up for a dead man, and answered him with mild and submissive words, saying: 'Sir Knight, the youth whom I am beating is mine own servant, and keepeth for me a flock of sheep; but he is grown so negligent that he loseth one of them every other day, and because I correct him for his carelessness and knavery, he says I do it through covetousness and miserliness so as not to pay him his due wages, but on my conscience I assure you he lies.'
'What? The lie, in my presence, rascally clown!' cried Don Quixote. 'By the sun that shines above us, I will run thee through and through with my lance, base Carle! Pay him instantly, without another word, or I will finish and destroy thee in a moment. Loose him forthwith!'
The Farmer, hanging down his head, made no reply, but released poor Andrew, of whom Don Quixote demanded how much his master owed him. The boy answered that it was nine months' wages at seven reals a month. Casting it up, Don Quixote found that it amounted to sixty-three reals, and commanded the Farmer to pay the money at once, unless he had a mind to die for it.
This the Farmer, who was in a terrible fright, promised to do, but said he: 'The worst of it is, Sir Knight, that I have no money here. Let Andrew come with me to my house, and I will pay him his wages to the last real.'
'I go with him?' said the boy, 'evil befall me if I do. No, Sir. I don't intend to do that, for as soon as ever we were alone, he would flay me alive.'