Part I, Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Of the good success which the valorous Don Quixote had in the dreadful and never-before-imagined adventure of the windmills, with other events worthy to be recorded.

As they were thus discoursing, they perceived some thirty or forty windmills that are in that plain; and as soon as Don Quixote espied them, he said to his squire:

'Fortune disposes our affairs better than we ourselves could have desired; look yonder, friend Sancho Panza, where you may discover somewhat more than thirty monstrous giants, with whom I intend to fight, and take away all their lives: with whose spoils we will begin to enrich ourselves; for it is lawful war, and doing God good service to take away so wicked a generation from off the face of the earth.'

'What giants?' said Sancho Panza.

'Those you see yonder,' answered his master, 'with those long arms; for some of them are wont to have them almost of the length of two leagues.'

'Consider, Sir,' answered Sancho, 'that those which appear yonder, are not giants, but windmills; and what seem to be arms are the sails, which, whirled about by the wind, make the millstone go.'

'One may easily see,' answered Don Quixote, 'that you are not versed in the business of adventures: they are giants; and, if you are afraid, get aside and pray, whilst I engage with them in a fierce and unequal combat.'

And so saying, he clapped spurs to Rosinante, without minding the cries his squire sent after him, assuring him that those he went to assault were without all doubt, windmills, and not giants. But he was so fully possessed that they were giants, that he neither heard the outcries of his squire Sancho, nor yet discerned what they were, though he was very near them, but went on, crying out loud:

'Fly not, ye cowards and vile caitiffs; for it is a single knight who assaults you.'

Now the wind rose a little, and the great sails began to move: which Don Quixote perceiving, he said:

'Well, though you should move more arms than the giant Briareus, you shall pay for it.'

And so saying, and recommending himself devoutly to his lady Dulcinea, beseeching her to succour him in the present danger, being well covered with his buckler, and setting his lance in the rest, he rushed on as fast as Rosinante could gallop, and attacked the first mill before him; and running his lance into the sail, the wind whirled dragging horse and rider after it, and tumbling them over and over on the plain, in very evil plight. Sancho Panza hastened to his assistance, as fast as his ass could carry him; and when he came up to him, he found him not able to stir; so violent was the blow he and Rosinante had received in falling.

'God save me,' quoth Sancho, 'did not I warn you to have a care of what you did, for that they were nothing but windmills; and nobody could mistake them, but one that had the like in his head.'

'Peace, friend Sancho,' answered Don Quixote; 'for matters of war are, of all others, most subject to continual mutations. Now I verily believe, and it is most certainly so, that the sage Friston who stole away my chamber and books, has metamorphosed these giants into windmills, on purpose to deprive me of the glory of vanguishing them, so great is the enmity he bears me; but when he has done his worst, his wicked arts will avail but little against the goodness of my sword.'

'God grant it, as he can,' answered Sancho Panza; and, helping him to rise, he mounted him again upon Rosinante, who was half shoulder-slipped.

(An extract from 'Don Quixote' by Miguel de Cervantes)

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Further reading:

"Monsignor Quixote" (1982) by Graham Green and the Quixote/Sancho relationship.