that, she said, and began her story.

But she came very near ending it then and there, for she could not
remember the name she had assumed. Luckily the curate--who had
invented her long and difficult name--was there to prompt her, and the
situation was saved. Having told Don Quixote that her name was
Princess Micomicona, she continued her story, relating how she was
left an orphan, how a certain giant and lord of an island near her
kingdom had asked for her hand in marriage and she had refused, how
his forces had overrun her country and she had fled to Spain, where it
had been predicted by a magician she would find a certain great knight
errant by the name of Don Quixote, otherwise called the Knight of the
Rueful Countenance, who would be recognized by a gray mole with hairs
like bristles under the left shoulder.

Immediately upon hearing this, Don Quixote wanted to strip, but Sancho
assured them that he did have just such a mark. Dorothea said she was
quite sure he must, for in other respects the description that the
magician had given fitted him; and she hastened to relate to him how
she had first heard of him on her landing at Osuna. But evidently the
pretended Princess had not been as careful a student of geography as
Don Quixote, who was quick to ask her: "But how did you land at Osuna,
senorita, when it is not a seaport?" Again the curate displayed proof
of rare presence of mind, for he broke in: "The Princess meant to say
that after having landed at Malaga, the first place where she heard of
your worship was Osuna." And Dorothea immediately corroborated the
curate's explanation with great self-assurance.

However, she thought it best to end her story here, for fear of
complications, and only added how happy she was to have found him so
soon. She also pointed out, demurely enough, that it had been
predicted if after having cut off the giant's head the knight should
ask her to marry him, she would accept. But Don Quixote said he would
be true to his Dulcinea; and this made Sancho exclaim with dismay
that he was out of his head, for Dulcinea could never come up to this
fair princess.

Sancho's remark angered his master so intensely that he knocked him to
the ground with his spear; and if the Princess had not interfered the
unfortunate squire might never again have been able to say his
ave-marias or credos or, more to the point, have eaten another square
meal. He was quick to cry out that he had meant no ill by w