第 九十五 章 · CHAPTER XLIII. OF THE SECOND SET OF COUNSELS DON QUIXOTE GAVE SANCHO PANZA

. CHAPTER XLIII. OF THE SECOND SET OF COUNSELS DON QUIXOTE GAVE SANCHO PANZA

CHAPTER XLIII.

OF THE SECOND SET OF COUNSELS DON QUIXOTE GAVE SANCHO PANZA

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Who, hearing the foregoing discourse of Don Quixote, would not have set

him down for a person of great good sense and greater rectitude of

purpose? But, as has been frequently observed in the course of this

great history, he only talked nonsense when he touched on chivalry, and

in discussing all other subjects showed that he had a clear and

unbiassed understanding; so that at every turn his acts gave the lie to

his intellect, and his intellect to his acts; but in the case of these

second counsels that he gave Sancho, he showed himself to have a lively

turn of humour, and displayed conspicuously his wisdom, and also his

folly.

Sancho listened to him with the deepest attention, and endeavoured to

fix his counsels in his memory, like one who meant to follow them and

by their means bring the full promise of his government to a happy

issue. Don Quixote, then, went on to say:

“With regard to the mode in which thou shouldst govern thy person and

thy house, Sancho, the first charge I have to give thee is to be clean,

and to cut thy nails, not letting them grow as some do, whose ignorance

makes them fancy that long nails are an ornament to their hands, as if

those excrescences they neglect to cut were nails, and not the talons

of a lizard-catching kestrel—a filthy and unnatural abuse.

“Go not ungirt and loose, Sancho; for disordered attire is a sign of an

unstable mind, unless indeed the slovenliness and slackness is to be

set down to craft, as was the common opinion in the case of Julius

Cæsar.

“Ascertain cautiously what thy office may be worth; and if it will

allow thee to give liveries to thy servants, give them respectable and

serviceable, rather than showy and gay ones, and divide them between

thy servants and the poor; that is to say, if thou canst clothe six

pages, clothe three and three poor men, and thus thou wilt have pages

for heaven and pages for earth; the vainglorious never think of this

new mode of giving liveries.

“Eat not garlic nor onions, lest they find out thy boorish origin by

the smell; walk slowly and speak deliberately, but not in such a way as

to make it seem thou art listening to thyself, for all affectation is

bad.

“Dine sparingly and sup more sparingly still; for the health of the

whole body is forged in the workshop of the stomach.

“Be temperate in drinking, bearing in mind that wine in excess keeps

neither secrets nor promises.

“Take care, Sancho, not to chew on both sides, and not to eruct in

anybody’s presence.”

“Eruct!” said Sancho; “I don’t know what that means.”

“To eruct, Sancho,” said Don Quixote, “means to belch, and that is one

of the filthiest words in the Spanish language, though a very

expressive one; and therefore nice folk have had recourse to the Latin,

and instead of belch say eruct, and instead of belches say eructations;

and if some do not understand these terms it matters little, for custom

will bring them into use in the course of time, so that they will be

readily understood; this is the way a language is enriched; custom and

the public are all-powerful there.”

“In truth, señor,” said Sancho, “one of the counsels and cautions I

mean to bear in mind shall be this, not to belch, for I’m constantly

doing it.”

“Eruct, Sancho, not belch,” said Don Quixote.

“Eruct, I shall say henceforth, and I swear not to forget it,” said

Sancho.

“Likewise, Sancho,” said Don Quixote, “thou must not mingle such a

quantity of proverbs in thy discourse as thou dost; for though proverbs

are short maxims, thou dost drag them in so often by the head and

shoulders that they savour more of nonsense than of maxims.”

“God alone can cure that,” said Sancho; “for I have more proverbs in me

than a book, and when I speak they come so thick together into my mouth

that they fall to fighting among themselves to get out; that’s why my

tongue lets fly the first that come, though they may not be pat to the

purpose. But I’ll take care henceforward to use such as befit the

dignity of my office; for ‘in a house where there’s plenty, supper is

soon cooked,’ and ‘he who binds does not wrangle,’ and ‘the

bell-ringer’s in a safe berth,’ and ‘giving and keeping require

brains.’”

“That’s it, Sancho!” said Don Quixote; “pack, tack, string proverbs

together; nobody is hindering thee! ‘My mother beats me, and I go on

with my tricks.’ I am bidding thee avoid proverbs, and here in a second

thou hast shot out a whole litany of them, which have as much to do

with what we are talking about as ‘over the hills of Úbeda.’ Mind,

Sancho, I do not say that a proverb aptly brought in is objectionable;

but to pile up and string together proverbs at random makes

conversation dull and vulgar.

“When thou ridest on horseback, do not go lolling with thy body on the

back of the saddle, nor carry thy legs stiff or sticking out from the

horse’s belly, nor yet sit so loosely that one would suppose thou wert

on Dapple; for the seat on a horse makes gentlemen of some and grooms

of others.

“Be moderate in thy sleep; for he who does not rise early does not get

the benefit of the day; and remember, Sancho, diligence is the mother

of good fortune, and indolence, its opposite, never yet attained the

object of an honest ambition.

“The last counsel I will give thee now, though it does not tend to

bodily improvement, I would have thee carry carefully in thy memory,

for I believe it will be no less useful to thee than those I have given

thee already, and it is this—never engage in a dispute about families,

at least in the way of comparing them one with another; for necessarily

one of those compared will be better than the other, and thou wilt be

hated by the one thou hast disparaged, and get nothing in any shape

from the one thou hast exalted.

“Thy attire shall be hose of full length, a long jerkin, and a cloak a

trifle longer; loose breeches by no means, for they are becoming

neither for gentlemen nor for governors.

“For the present, Sancho, this is all that has occurred to me to advise

thee; as time goes by and occasions arise my instructions shall follow,

if thou take care to let me know how thou art circumstanced.”

“Señor,” said Sancho, “I see well enough that all these things your

worship has said to me are good, holy, and profitable; but what use

will they be to me if I don’t remember one of them? To be sure that

about not letting my nails grow, and marrying again if I have the

chance, will not slip out of my head; but all that other hash, muddle,

and jumble—I don’t and can’t recollect any more of it than of last

year’s clouds; so it must be given me in writing; for though I can’t

either read or write, I’ll give it to my confessor, to drive it into me

and remind me of it whenever it is necessary.”

“Ah, sinner that I am!” said Don Quixote, “how bad it looks in

governors not to know how to read or write; for let me tell thee,

Sancho, when a man knows not how to read, or is left-handed, it argues

one of two things; either that he was the son of exceedingly mean and

lowly parents, or that he himself was so incorrigible and

ill-conditioned that neither good company nor good teaching could make

any impression on him. It is a great defect that thou labourest under,

and therefore I would have thee learn at any rate to sign thy name.”

“I can sign my name well enough,” said Sancho, “for when I was steward

of the brotherhood in my village I learned to make certain letters,

like the marks on bales of goods, which they told me made out my name.

Besides I can pretend my right hand is disabled and make someone else

sign for me, for ‘there’s a remedy for everything except death;’ and as

I shall be in command and hold the staff, I can do as I like; moreover,

‘he who has the alcalde for his father—,’ and I’ll be governor, and

that’s higher than alcalde. Only come and see! Let them make light of

me and abuse me; ‘they’ll come for wool and go back shorn;’ ‘whom God

loves, his house is known to Him;’ ‘the silly sayings of the rich pass

for saws in the world;’ and as I’ll be rich, being a governor, and at

the same time generous, as I mean to be, no fault will be seen in me.

‘Only make yourself honey and the flies will suck you;’ ‘as much as

thou hast so much art thou worth,’ as my grandmother used to say; and

‘thou canst have no revenge of a man of substance.’”

“Oh, God’s curse upon thee, Sancho!” here exclaimed Don Quixote; “sixty

thousand devils fly away with thee and thy proverbs! For the last hour

thou hast been stringing them together and inflicting the pangs of

torture on me with every one of them. Those proverbs will bring thee to

the gallows one day, I promise thee; thy subjects will take the

government from thee, or there will be revolts among them. Tell me,

where dost thou pick them up, thou booby? How dost thou apply them,

thou blockhead? For with me, to utter one and make it apply properly, I

have to sweat and labour as if I were digging.”

“By God, master mine,” said Sancho, “your worship is making a fuss

about very little. Why the devil should you be vexed if I make use of

what is my own? And I have got nothing else, nor any other stock in

trade except proverbs and more proverbs; and here are three just this

instant come into my head, pat to the purpose and like pears in a

basket; but I won’t repeat them, for ‘sage silence is called Sancho.’”

“That, Sancho, thou art not,” said Don Quixote; “for not only art thou

not sage silence, but thou art pestilent prate and perversity; still I

would like to know what three proverbs have just now come into thy

memory, for I have been turning over mine own—and it is a good one—and

none occurs to me.”

“What can be better,” said Sancho, “than ‘never put thy thumbs between

two back teeth;’ and ‘to “_get out of my house_” and “_what do you want

with my wife?_” there is no answer;’ and ‘whether the pitcher hits the

stone, or the stone the pitcher, it’s a bad business for the pitcher;’

all which fit to a hair? For no one should quarrel with his governor,

or him in authority over him, because he will come off the worst, as he

does who puts his finger between two back and if they are not back

teeth it makes no difference, so long as they are teeth; and to

whatever the governor may say there’s no answer, any more than to ‘get

out of my house’ and ‘what do you want with my wife?’ and then, as for

that about the stone and the pitcher, a blind man could see that. So

that he ‘who sees the mote in another’s eye had need to see the beam in

his own,’ that it be not said of himself, ‘the dead woman was

frightened at the one with her throat cut;’ and your worship knows well

that ‘the fool knows more in his own house than the wise man in

another’s.’”

“Nay, Sancho,” said Don Quixote, “the fool knows nothing, either in his

own house or in anybody else’s, for no wise structure of any sort can

stand on a foundation of folly; but let us say no more about it,

Sancho, for if thou governest badly, thine will be the fault and mine

the shame; but I comfort myself with having done my duty in advising

thee as earnestly and as wisely as I could; and thus I am released from

my obligations and my promise. God guide thee, Sancho, and govern thee

in thy government, and deliver me from the misgiving I have that thou

wilt turn the whole island upside down, a thing I might easily prevent

by explaining to the duke what thou art and telling him that all that

fat little person of thine is nothing else but a sack full of proverbs

and sauciness.”

“Señor,” said Sancho, “if your worship thinks I’m not fit for this

government, I give it up on the spot; for the mere black of the nail of

my soul is dearer to me than my whole body; and I can live just as

well, simple Sancho, on bread and onions, as governor, on partridges

and capons; and what’s more, while we’re asleep we’re all equal, great

and small, rich and poor. But if your worship looks into it, you will

see it was your worship alone that put me on to this business of

governing; for I know no more about the government of islands than a

buzzard; and if there’s any reason to think that because of my being a

governor the devil will get hold of me, I’d rather go Sancho to heaven

than governor to hell.”

“By God, Sancho,” said Don Quixote, “for those last words thou hast

uttered alone, I consider thou deservest to be governor of a thousand

islands. Thou hast good natural instincts, without which no knowledge

is worth anything; commend thyself to God, and try not to swerve in the

pursuit of thy main object; I mean, always make it thy aim and fixed

purpose to do right in all matters that come before thee, for heaven

always helps good intentions; and now let us go to dinner, for I think

my lord and lady are waiting for us.”

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