concerns keeping him clean and comfortable; in this I will dance
attendance on him readily; but to expect me to draw sword, even against
rascally churls of the hatchet and hood, is idle. I don't set up to be a
fighting man, Senor Samson, but only the best and most loyal squire that
ever served knight-errant; and if my master Don Quixote, in consideration
of my many faithful services, is pleased to give me some island of the
many his worship says one may stumble on in these parts, I will take it
as a great favour; and if he does not give it to me, I was born like
everyone else, and a man must not live in dependence on anyone except
God; and what is more, my bread will taste as well, and perhaps even
better, without a government than if I were a governor; and how do I know
but that in these governments the devil may have prepared some trip for
me, to make me lose my footing and fall and knock my grinders out? Sancho
I was born and Sancho I mean to die. But for all that, if heaven were to
make me a fair offer of an island or something else of the kind, without
much trouble and without much risk, I am not such a fool as to refuse it;
for they say, too, 'when they offer thee a heifer, run with a halter; and
'when good luck comes to thee, take it in.'"

"Brother Sancho," said Carrasco, "you have spoken like a professor; but,
for all that, put your trust in God and in Senor Don Quixote, for he will
give you a kingdom, not to say an island."

"It is all the same, be it more or be it less," replied Sancho; "though I
can tell Senor Carrasco that my master would not throw the kingdom he
might give me into a sack all in holes; for I have felt my own pulse and
I find myself sound enough to rule kingdoms and govern islands; and I
have before now told my master as much."

"Take care, Sancho," said Samson; "honours change manners, and perhaps