her
by word of mouth about the love your worship bore her, and the
extraordinary penance you were doing for her sake, was enough; and, to
make an end of it, she told me to tell your worship that she kissed your
hands, and that she had a greater desire to see you than to write to you;
and that therefore she entreated and commanded you, on sight of this
present, to come out of these thickets, and to have done with carrying on
absurdities, and to set out at once for El Toboso, unless something else
of greater importance should happen, for she had a great desire to see
your worship. She laughed greatly when I told her how your worship was
called The Knight of the Rueful Countenance; I asked her if that Biscayan
the other day had been there; and she told me he had, and that he was an
honest fellow; I asked her too about the galley slaves, but she said she
had not seen any as yet."

"So far all goes well," said Don Quixote; "but tell me what jewel was it
that she gave thee on taking thy leave, in return for thy tidings of me?
For it is a usual and ancient custom with knights and ladies errant to
give the squires, damsels, or dwarfs who bring tidings of their ladies to
the knights, or of their knights to the ladies, some rich jewel as a
guerdon for good news,' and acknowledgment of the message."

"That is very likely," said Sancho, "and a good custom it was, to my
mind; but that must have been in days gone by, for now it would seem to
be the custom only to give a piece of bread and cheese; because that was
what my lady Dulcinea gave me over the top of the yard-wall when I took
leave of her; and more by token it was sheep's-milk cheese."

"She is generous in the extreme," said Don Quixote, "and if she did not
give thee a jewel of gold, no doubt it must have been because she had not
one to hand there to give thee; but sleeves are good after Easter; I
shall see her and all shall be made right. But knowest thou what amazes
me, Sancho? It seems to me thou must have gone and come through the air,
for thou hast taken but little more than three days to go to El Toboso
and return, though it is more than thirty leagues from here to there.
From which I am inclined to think that the sage magician who is my
friend, and watches over my interests (for of necessity there is and must
be one, or else I should not be a right knight-errant), that this same, I
say, must have helped thee to travel without thy knowledge; for some of
these sages wi