early in 1503, was educated at the University of
Salamanca, and spent most of the rest of his days in courts
and camps. He died at Madrid in April 1575. Although written
during Mendoza's college days, "Lazarillo de Tormes" did not
appear until 1533, when it was published anonymously at
Antwerp. During the following year it was reprinted at Bruges,
but it fell under the ban of the Inquisition, and subsequent
editions were considerably expurgated. Such was its popularity
that it was continued by inferior authors after Mendoza's
death.

_I.--The Blind Man_

You must know, in the first place, that my name is Lazarillo de Tormes,
and that I am the son of Thomas Gonzalez and Antonia Perez, natives of
Tejares, a village of Salamanca. My father was employed to superintend
the operations of a water-mill on the river Tormes, from which I took my
surname; and I had only reached my ninth year, when he was taken into
custody for administering certain copious, but injudicious, bleedings to
the sacks of customers. Being thrown out of employment by this disaster,
he joined an armament then preparing against the Moors in the quality of
mule-driver to a gentleman; and in that expedition he, along with his
master, finished his life and services together.

My widowed mother hired a small place in the city of Salamanca, and
opened an eating-house for the accommodation of students. It happened
some time afterwards that a blind man came to lodge at the house, and
thinking that I should do very well to lead him about, asked my mother
to part with me. He promised to receive me not as a servant, but as a
son; and thus I left Salamanca with my blind and aged master. He was as
keen as an eagle in his own calling. He knew prayers suitable for all
occasions, and could repeat them with a devout and humble countenance;
he could prognosticate; and with respect to the medicinal art, he would
tell you that Galen was an ignoramus compared with him. By these means
his profits were very considerable.

With all this, however, I am sorry to say that I never met with so
avaricious and so wicked an old curmudgeon; he allowed me almost daily
to die of hunger, without troubling himself about my necessities; and,
to say the truth, if I had not helped myself by means of a ready wit I
should have closed my account from sheer starvation.

The old man was accustomed to carry his food in a sort of linen
knapsack, s