Don Quixote

by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

“You know very well, O Sancho Panza, my neighbor and friend, how the proclamation and edict that His Majesty issued against those of my race brought terror and fear to all of us; at least, I was so affected, I think that even before the time granted to us for leaving Spain had expired, I was already imagining that the harsh penalty had been inflicted on me and my children. And so I arranged, as a prudent man, I think, and as one who knows that by a certain date the house where he lives will be taken away and he’ll need to have another one to move into, I arranged, as I said, to leave the village alone, without my family, and find a place where I could take them in comfort and without the haste with which others were leaving; because I saw clearly, as did all our elders, that those proclamations were not mere threats, as some were saying, but real laws that would be put into effect at the appointed time;