t under fifteen nor above eighteen.

Such was the spectacle that filled Sancho with amazement, fascinated Don
Quixote, made the sun halt in his course to behold them, and held all
four in a strange silence. One of the shepherdesses, at length, was the
first to speak and said to Don Quixote, "Hold, sir knight, and do not
break these nets; for they are not spread here to do you any harm, but
only for our amusement; and as I know you will ask why they have been put
up, and who we are, I will tell you in a few words. In a village some two
leagues from this, where there are many people of quality and rich
gentlefolk, it was agreed upon by a number of friends and relations to
come with their wives, sons and daughters, neighbours, friends and
kinsmen, and make holiday in this spot, which is one of the pleasantest
in the whole neighbourhood, setting up a new pastoral Arcadia among
ourselves, we maidens dressing ourselves as shepherdesses and the youths
as shepherds. We have prepared two eclogues, one by the famous poet
Garcilasso, the other by the most excellent Camoens, in its own
Portuguese tongue, but we have not as yet acted them. Yesterday was the
first day of our coming here; we have a few of what they say are called
field-tents pitched among the trees on the bank of an ample brook that
fertilises all these meadows; last night we spread these nets in the
trees here to snare the silly little birds that startled by the noise we
make may fly into them. If you please to be our guest, senor, you will be
welcomed heartily and courteously, for here just now neither care nor
sorrow shall enter."

She held her peace and said no more, and Don Quixote made answer, "Of a
truth, fairest lady, Actaeon when he unexpectedly beheld Diana bathing in
the stream could not have been more fascinated and wonderstruck than I at
the sight of your beauty. I commend your mode of entertainment, and thank
you for the kindness of your invitation; and if I can serve you, you may
command me with full confidence of being obeyed, for my profession is
none other than to show myself grateful, and ready to serve persons of
all conditions, but especially persons of quality such as your appearance
indicates; and if, instead of taking up, as they probably do, but a small
space, these nets took up the whole surface of the globe, I would seek
out new worlds through which to pass, so as not to break them; and that
ye may give some degree of credence to this exagge