s to their faithful
squires. But Sancho shook his head. "Though it rain kingdoms on the face
of the earth, not one of them would fit well upon the head of my wife;
for, I must needs tell you, she is not worth two brass-jacks to make a
queen of."

As they were thus discoursing they espied some thirty windmills in the
plain, which Don Quixote instantly took for giants. Nothing that Sancho
said could dissuade him, and he must needs clap spurs to his horse and
ride a-tilt at these great windmills, recommending himself to his lady
Dulcinea. As he ran his lance into the sail of the first mill, the wind
whirled about with such swiftness that the motion broke the lance into
shivers, and hurled away both knight and horse along with it. When
Sancho came upon his master the Don explained that some cursed
necromancer had converted those giants into windmills to deprive him of
the honour of victory.

When the knight was recovered they continued their way, and their next
adventure was to meet two monks on mules riding before a coach, with
four or five men on horseback, wherein sat a lady going to Seville to
meet her husband. Don Quixote rode forward, addressed the monks as
"cursed implements of hell," and bade them instantly release the lovely
princess in the coach. The monks flew for their lives as Don Quixote
charged down upon them, but Sancho was thrown down by the servants, who
tore his beard, trampled his stomach, beat and mauled him in every part
of his body, and then left him sprawling without breath or motion.

As for Don Quixote, he came off victor in this conflict, and only
desisted from slaying his assailant on the plea of the lady in the
coach, and on her promise that the conquered man should present himself
before the peerless Dulcinea del Toboso. The recovered Sancho was
surprised to find that his master had no island to bestow upon him after
this incredible victory, wherein he himself had suffered so
disastrously.

In a fierce encounter with some Yanguesian carriers, Don Quixote was
wounded almost to death, and he explained to Sancho that his defeat he
owed to fighting with common people, bidding Sancho in future to fight
himself against such common fellows.

"Sir," said Sancho, "I am a peaceful man, a quiet fellow, do you see; I
can make shift to forgive injuries as well as any man, as having a wife
to maintain, and children to bring up. I freely forgive all mankind,
high and low, lords and beggars, whatsoever w