And as he rode he saw a man on top of a little mountain, leaping from rock to rock and tuft to tuft with marvellous agility. He made him out to be half-naked, with a black and matted beard, his hair long and tangled, his feet unshod, and his legs bare. He wore some breeches of tawny velvet, but these appeared so torn to rags that his skin showed in many places. His head, too, was bare, and although he ran by with all haste, yet was the Knight able to mark all these things. But he could not follow him, because it was not in Rozinante's power, being in a weak state and naturally very slow and steady-going, to travel over these rough places at any speed. Don Quixote at once came to the conclusion that he was the owner of the portmanteau, and resolved to go in search of him, even if he should have to spend a whole year in the mountains till he found him. So he commanded Sancho to go on one side of the mountain, while he went the other, and, said he, 'one of us may thus come across this man who has vanished so suddenly out of our sight.'

'I dare not do so,' replied Sancho, 'for on parting one step from you, fear seizes me and fills me with a thousand kinds of terror and affright. Let me say, once for all, that henceforth I do not stir a finger's-breadth from your presence.'

'Well,' replied Don Quixote, 'I am glad that thou dost build upon my valour, which shall not fail thee even though everything else fails thee. Follow me, then, and keep thine eyes open, so that we may find this strange man, who is no doubt the owner of the portmanteau.'

'Surely,' said Sancho, 'it were better not to find him, for if we should meet him, and he turned out to be the owner of the money, we should have to return it to him. Let us rather keep it faithfully until some one turns up to claim it, when perhaps I shall have spent it all, and in that case I shall be free from blame.'

'In that thou art mistaken, Sancho,' replied Don Quixote, 'for now that we have a suspicion who the owner is, we are bound to search him out and restore him his money.'

So saying Don Quixote led the way, and in a little time they came upon a dead mule, half devoured by dogs and crows; and as they were looking at it they heard a whistle, such as shepherds use, and there appeared at their left hand a great number of goats, and behind them on the top of the mountain was the Goatherd, who was quite an old man.

Don Quixote called to him, and begged him to come down to where they stood; and the Goatherd, after looking at them for a few minutes, in surprise at seeing them in this lonely spot, descended to where they stood.

'I wager,' he said, as he came towards them, 'that you are wondering how the mule came there that lies dead in that bottom. Well, it has been lying there these six months. Tell me, have you come across his master as yet?'

'We have fallen in with nobody,' replied Don Quixote, 'but a saddle cushion and a portmanteau, which we found not far from here.'