Don Quixote

by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

“That cannot be,” returned Don Quixote, “because night overtook me while I was there, and day came, and it was night again and day again three times; so that, by my reckoning, I have been three days in those remote regions beyond our ken.” “My master must be right,” replied Sancho; “for as everything that has happened to him is by enchantment, maybe what seems to us an hour would seem three days and nights there.” “That’s it,” said Don Quixote. “And did your worship eat anything all that time, senor?” asked the cousin. “I never touched a morsel,” answered Don Quixote, “nor did I feel hunger, or think of it.” “And do the enchanted eat?” said the cousin. “They neither eat,” said Don Quixote; “nor are they subject to the greater excrements, though it is thought that their nails, beards, and hair grow.” “And do the enchanted sleep, now, senor?” asked Sancho. “Certainly not,” replied Don Quixote; “at least, during those three days I was with them not one of them closed an eye, nor did I either.” “The proverb, ‘Tell me what company thou keepest and I’ll tell thee what thou art,’ is to the point here,” said Sancho; “your worship keeps company with enchanted people that are always fasting and watching; what wonder is it, then, that you neither eat nor sleep while you are with them? But forgive me, senor, if I say that of all this you have told us now, may God take me — I was just going to say the devil — if I believe a single particle.”