a long way

free yourself and refresh your memory

Which authors consider to be men of great reading, erudite, and eloquent? And what, good God! do they cite Holy Scripture? Would it not seem as if they were so many Saint Thomases and Doctors of the Church, maintaining in this such ingenious decorum that, after having depicted, in one line, a depraved lover, they deliver, in the next line, a little Christian sermon, so pretty that it is a joy to read or hear it?

My book will be lacking in all this: for I have nothing to annotate in the margin, nothing to comment on at the end, and I also do not know which authors I have followed in it, in order to cite their names at the head of the book, as all the others do, by the letters of the ABC, beginning with Aristotle and ending with Xenophon, or with Zoilus or Zeuxis, although one is an envious critic and the second a painter. My book will still lack sonnets as an introduction, at least sonnets whose authors are dukes, counts, marquises, bishops, great ladies or famous poets; although, if I were to ask two or three friends, people in the profession, for some, I know that they would give them to me, and such

that those of the most renowned in our Spain would not equal them. Finally, my friend and lord, I continued, I have resolved that the lord Don Quixote remain buried in his archives in La Mancha, until heaven sends him someone who adorns it with so many things of which he is destitute; for I feel incapable of providing them, because of my inadequacy and my puny erudition, and because I am naturally lazy to go in search of authors who say for me what I know how to say without them. This is where the indecision and the reverie in which you found me come from, a cause quite sufficient, as you have just heard, to keep me immersed in it. »

When my friend had listened to this speech, he struck his forehead with the palm of his hand, and burst into a fit of laughter:

"By God, brother," he cried, "you have just pulled me out of an error in which I have remained for the long time I have known you. I had always considered you to be a man of sound mind, and wise in all your actions, but I see

now that you are as far from this man as the earth is from heaven. How is it possible that such trifles, and so easily encountered, have the power to forbid and absorb a mind as mature as yours, so accustomed to approaching and overcoming difficulties far greater? In truth, it does not come from a lack of talent, but from excessive laziness and an absence of reflection. Do you want to test if what I say is true? Well! Pay attention, and you will see how, in the twinkling of an eye, I dispel all these difficulties and remedy all these defects which embarrass you, you say, and frighten you to the point of making you renounce bringing to light the history of your famous Don Quixote, mirror and light of all chivalry-errantry.

"Let's see," I replied to his offer; How do you intend to fill the void that frightens me, and to clarify the chaos of my confusion?

He replied:

"To the first thing that troubles you, that is to say, the lack of sonnets, epigrams and

eulogies to put at the head of the book, here is the remedy I propose: take the trouble to write them yourself; then you can baptize and name them as you please, giving them as godfathers Preste-Jean des Indes or the Emperor of Trebizond, of whom I know that it has been rumored that they were excellent poets; but even if they were not, and some pedantic bachelors took it into their heads to bite you from behind about this assertion, do not pay attention to two maravedis; for, even if the lie were proven, no one will cut off your hand that wrote it.

"As for quoting in the margin the books and authors from which you have taken the sentences and maxims that you will place in your history,

You only have to arrange it so that some Latin saying comes up appropriately, one that you know by heart, or that will not cost you much trouble to find. For example, when speaking of liberty and s*****y, you could put:

Non bene pro toto libertas venditur aura, and quote Horace in the margin, or whoever said it. If it is a question of the power of death, you will immediately resort to the couplet:

Pallida mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum

tabernas

Regumque turres.

If it is a question of the affection and love that God commands us to have for our enemy, enter

immediately into divine Scripture, what you

can do with a little attention, and at least quote the words of God himself: vestros." If you deal with evil thoughts,

the Gospel:

cogitationes malae; "if you deal with the instability of friends, here is Cato who will lend you his couplet:

Donec eris felix, multos numerabis amicos;

Tempora si fuerint nubila, solus eris.

With these scraps of Latin, and a few others of the same ilk, you will at least be considered a grammarian, which, at the present time, is no small honor or small profit.

"As for putting notes and commentaries at the end of the book, you can safely do it in this way: if you have to name some giant in your book, make it the giant Gotath, and you tongue

ready-made annotation; for you could say:

"The giant Goliath, or Goliath, was a Philistine whom the shepherd David killed with a mighty slingshot in the Valley of Terebinth, as is recounted in the Book of Kings, in the chapter where you will find his story." After that, to show yourself to be a learned man, versed in human literature and cosmography, arrange for the Tagus River to be mentioned in some passage of your book, and there you have another magnificent commentary.

You only have to put: "The Tagus River was so named after an ancient king of Spain; it has its source in such a place, and its mouth in the Ocean, where it flows, after washing the walls of the famous city of Lisbon. It is said to roll down golden sands." If you have to talk about thieves, I will provide you with the story of Cacus, which I know by heart; if you have lost women, here is the Bishop of Mondoñedo who will lend you Lamia, Layda and

Flora, and the material for a note of great credit; if cruel ones, Ovid will provide you with Medea; if enchantresses, Homer has Calypso, and Virgil, Circe; if valiant captains, Julius Caesar will lend himself in his Commentaries, and Plutarch will give you a thousand Alexanders. Do you have to talk about loves? If you know a few words of the Italian language, you will find in Leone Hebreo enough to fill the whole measure; and if you dislike going in search of foreign lands, you have at home Fonseca and his Amor de Dier, which contains everything that you and the most ingenious could desire in a similar matter. In a word, you have only to make sure to cite the names that I have just mentioned.