My soul enclosing, hither am I come,
To tell the cure of such uncommon ills.

O glory thou of all that case their limbs
In polished steel and fenceful adamant!
Light, beacon, polar star, and glorious guide
Of all who, starting from the lazy down,
Banish ignoble sleep for the rude toil
And hardy exercise of errant arms!
Spain's boasted pride, La Mancha's matchless knight,
Whose valiant deeds outstrip pursuing fame!
Wouldst thou to beauty's pristine state restore
The enchanted dame, Sancho, thy faithful squire,
Must to his brawny buttocks, bare exposed,
Three thousand and three hundred stripes apply,
Such as may sting and give him smarting pain:
The authors of her change have thus decreed,
And this is Merlin's errand from the shades.

THE PARLEY ABOUT THE PENANCE.

"What!" quoth Sancho, "three thousand lashes! Odd's-flesh! I will as
soon give myself three stabs as three single lashes, much less three
thousand! The devil take this way of disenchanting! I cannot see what my
buttocks have to do with enchantments. Before Heaven! if Signor Merlin
can find out no other way to disenchant the lady Dulcinea del Toboso,
enchanted she may go to her grave for me!"

"Not lash thyself! thou garlic-eating wretch!" quoth Don Quixote; "I
shall take thee to a tree, and tie thee naked as thou wert born, and
there, not three thousand and three hundred, but six thousand six
hundred lashes will I give thee, and those so well laid on that three
thousand three hundred hard tugs shall not tug them off. So answer me
not a word, scoundrel! for I will tear thy very soul out!"

"It must not be so," said Merlin; "the lashes that honest Sancho is to
receive must not be applied by force, but with his good-will, and at
whatever time he pleases, for no term is fixed; and furthermore, he is
allowed, if he please, to save himself half the trouble of applying so
many lashes, by having half the number laid on by another hand, provided
that hand be somewhat heavier than his own."

"Neither another hand nor my own," quoth Sancho, "no hand, either heavy
or light, shall touch my flesh. Was the lady Dulcinea brought forth by
me that my posteriors must pay for the transgressions of her eyes? My
master, indeed, who is part of her, since at every step he is calling
her his life, his soul, his support and stay,--he it is who ought to
lash himself for her and do all that is needful for her delivery; but
for me to whip myself,