curtsey.
"Less politeness and less paint, senora duenna," said Sancho; "by God
your hands smell of vinegar-wash."
In fine, all the duennas smacked him and several others of the household
pinched him; but what he could not stand was being pricked by the pins;
and so, apparently out of patience, he started up out of his chair, and
seizing a lighted torch that stood near him fell upon the duennas and the
whole set of his tormentors, exclaiming, "Begone, ye ministers of hell;
I'm not made of brass not to feel such out-of-the-way tortures."
At this instant Altisidora, who probably was tired of having been so long
lying on her back, turned on her side; seeing which the bystanders cried
out almost with one voice, "Altisidora is alive! Altisidora lives!"
Rhadamanthus bade Sancho put away his wrath, as the object they had in
view was now attained. When Don Quixote saw Altisidora move, he went on
his knees to Sancho saying to him, "Now is the time, son of my bowels,
not to call thee my squire, for thee to give thyself some of those lashes
thou art bound to lay on for the disenchantment of Dulcinea. Now, I say,
is the time when the virtue that is in thee is ripe, and endowed with
efficacy to work the good that is looked for from thee."
To which Sancho made answer, "That's trick upon trick, I think, and not
honey upon pancakes; a nice thing it would be for a whipping to come now,
on the top of pinches, smacks, and pin-proddings! You had better take a
big stone and tie it round my neck, and pitch me into a well; I should
not mind it much, if I'm to be always made the cow of the wedding for the
cure of other people's ailments. Leave me alone; or else by God I'll
fling the whole thing to the dogs, let come what may."
Altisidora had by this time sat up on the catafalque, and as she did so
the clarions sounded, accompanied by the flutes, and the voices of all
present exclaiming, "Long life to Altisidora! long life to Altisidora!"
The duke and duchess and the kings Minos and Rhadamanthus stood up, and
all, together with Don Quixote and Sancho, advanced to receive her and
take her down from the catafalque; and she, making as though she were
recovering from a swoon, bowed her head to the duke and duchess and to
the kings, and looking sideways at Don Quixote, said to him, "God forgive
thee, insensible knight, for through thy cruelty I have been, to me it
seems, more than a thousand years in the other world; and to thee, the
most
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