ct freedom give range to his
thoughts of love while he followed the virtuous pastoral calling; and he
besought them, if they had not a great deal to do and were not prevented
by more important business, to consent to be his companions, for he would
buy sheep enough to qualify them for shepherds; and the most important
point of the whole affair, he could tell them, was settled, for he had
given them names that would fit them to a T. The curate asked what they
were. Don Quixote replied that he himself was to be called the shepherd
Quixotize and the bachelor the shepherd Carrascon, and the curate the
shepherd Curambro, and Sancho Panza the shepherd Pancino.

Both were astounded at Don Quixote's new craze; however, lest he should
once more make off out of the village from them in pursuit of his
chivalry, they trusting that in the course of the year he might be cured,
fell in with his new project, applauded his crazy idea as a bright one,
and offered to share the life with him. "And what's more," said Samson
Carrasco, "I am, as all the world knows, a very famous poet, and I'll be
always making verses, pastoral, or courtly, or as it may come into my
head, to pass away our time in those secluded regions where we shall be
roaming. But what is most needful, sirs, is that each of us should choose
the name of the shepherdess he means to glorify in his verses, and that
we should not leave a tree, be it ever so hard, without writing up and
carving her name on it, as is the habit and custom of love-smitten
shepherds."

"That's the very thing," said Don Quixote; "though I am relieved from
looking for the name of an imaginary shepherdess, for there's the
peerless Dulcinea del Toboso, the glory of these brooksides, the ornament
of these meadows, the mainstay of beauty, the cream of all the graces,
and, in a word, the being to whom all praise is appropriate, be it ever
so hyperbolical."

"Very true," said the curate; "but we the others must look about for
accommodating shepherdesses that will answer our purpose one way or
another."

"And," added Samson Carrasco, "if they fail us, we can call them by the
names of the ones in print that the world is filled with, Filidas,
Amarilises, Dianas, Fleridas, Galateas, Belisardas; for as they sell them
in the market-places we may fairly buy them and make them our own. If my
lady, or I should say my shepherdess, happens to be called Ana, I'll sing
her praises under the name of Anarda, and if Fra