"Let us be off, senor," said Sancho, "for I have taken the beards and
tears of these ladies deeply to heart, and I shan't eat a bit to relish
it until I have seen them restored to their former smoothness. Mount,
your worship, and blindfold yourself, for if I am to go on the croup, it
is plain the rider in the saddle must mount first."

"That is true," said Don Quixote, and, taking a handkerchief out of his
pocket, he begged the Distressed One to bandage his eyes very carefully;
but after having them bandaged he uncovered them again, saying, "If my
memory does not deceive me, I have read in Virgil of the Palladium of
Troy, a wooden horse the Greeks offered to the goddess Pallas, which was
big with armed knights, who were afterwards the destruction of Troy; so
it would be as well to see, first of all, what Clavileno has in his
stomach."

"There is no occasion," said the Distressed One; "I will be bail for him,
and I know that Malambruno has nothing tricky or treacherous about him;
you may mount without any fear, Senor Don Quixote; on my head be it if
any harm befalls you."

Don Quixote thought that to say anything further with regard to his
safety would be putting his courage in an unfavourable light; and so,
without more words, he mounted Clavileno, and tried the peg, which turned
easily; and as he had no stirrups and his legs hung down, he looked like
nothing so much as a figure in some Roman triumph painted or embroidered
on a Flemish tapestry.

Much against the grain, and very slowly, Sancho proceeded to mount, and,
after settling himself as well as he could on the croup, found it rather