kept saying, "Fly not, cowards and
caitiffs! stay, for not by my fault, but my horse's, am I stretched
here."

One of the muleteers in attendance, who could not have had much
good-nature in him, hearing the poor prostrate man blustering in this
style, was unable to refrain from giving him an answer on his ribs;
and coming up to him he seized his lance, and having broken it in
pieces, with one of them he began so to belabor our Don Quixote that,
notwithstanding and in spite of his armor, he milled him like a
measure of wheat. His masters called out not to lay on so hard and to
leave him alone, but the muleteer's blood was up, and he did not care
to drop the game until he had vented the rest of his wrath; and
gathering up the remaining fragments of the lance he finished with a
discharge upon the unhappy victim, who all through the storm of sticks
that rained on him never ceased threatening heaven, and earth, and the
brigands--for such they seemed to him. At last the muleteer was tired,
and the traders continued their journey, taking with them matter for
talk about the poor fellow who had been cudgeled. He, when he found
himself alone, made another effort to rise; but if he was unable when
whole and sound, how was he to rise after having been thrashed and
well-nigh knocked to pieces! And yet he esteemed himself fortunate, as
it seemed to him that this was a regular knight-errant's mishap, and
entirely, he considered, the fault of his horse. However, battered in
body as he was, to rise was beyond his power.

DON QUIXOTE AND SANCHO PANZA SALLY FORTH: AND THE ADVENTURE WITH THE
WINDMILLS

He remained at home fifteen days very quietly, without showing any
signs of a desire to take up with his former delusions; and during
this time he held lively discussions with his two gossips, the curate
and the barber, on the point he maintained, that knights-errant were
what the world stood most in need of, and that in him was to be
accomplished the revival of knight-errantry. The curate sometimes
contradicted him, sometimes agreed with him, for if he had not
observed this precaution he would have been unable to bring him to
reason.

Meanwhile Don Quixote worked upon a farm-laborer, a neighbor of his,
an honest man (if indeed that title can be given to him who is poor),
but with very little wit in his pate. In a word, he so talked him
over, and with such persuasions and promises, that the poor clown made
up his mind to sally f