which Sancho carried like a valise in front
of Dapple's pack-saddle; and if the man in green examined Don Quixote
closely, still more closely did Don Quixote examine the man in green, who
struck him as being a man of intelligence. In appearance he was about
fifty years of age, with but few grey hairs, an aquiline cast of
features, and an expression between grave and gay; and his dress and
accoutrements showed him to be a man of good condition. What he in green
thought of Don Quixote of La Mancha was that a man of that sort and shape
he had never yet seen; he marvelled at the length of his hair, his lofty
stature, the lankness and sallowness of his countenance, his armour, his
bearing and his gravity--a figure and picture such as had not been seen
in those regions for many a long day.

Don Quixote saw very plainly the attention with which the traveller was
regarding him, and read his curiosity in his astonishment; and courteous
as he was and ready to please everybody, before the other could ask him
any question he anticipated him by saying, "The appearance I present to
your worship being so strange and so out of the common, I should not be
surprised if it filled you with wonder; but you will cease to wonder when
I tell you, as I do, that I am one of those knights who, as people say,
go seeking adventures. I have left my home, I have mortgaged my estate, I
have given up my comforts, and committed myself to the arms of Fortune,
to bear me whithersoever she may please. My desire was to bring to life
again knight-errantry, now dead, and for some time past, stumbling here,
falling there, now coming down headlong, now raising myself up again, I
have carried out a great portion of my design, succouring widows,
protecting maidens, and giving aid to wives, orphans, and minors, the
proper and natural duty of knights-errant; and, therefore, because of my
many valiant and Christian achievements, I have been already found worthy
to make my way in print to well-nigh all, or most, of the nations of the
earth. Thirty thousand volumes of my history have been printed, and it is
on the high-road to be printed thirty thousand thousands of times, if
heaven does not put a stop to it. In short, to sum up all in a few words,
or in a single one, I may tell you I am Don Quixote of La Mancha,
otherwise called 'The Knight of the Rueful Countenance;' for though
self-praise is degrading, I must perforce sound my own sometimes, that is
to say, when th