Every knight-errant, said Don Quixote, is obliged to quarrel with those who are out of their senses, as well as those who are in them, if they disparage the honour of women, whatsoever they might be.
In like manner, Sancho, Dulcinea del Toboso is as proper for my occasions as the highest princess upon earth. All the poets, who have celebrated ladies, under names which they invented at pleasure, had not really such mistresses as they describe.
Sancho uttered this piece of wrong-headed information with such composure, wiping his nose from time to time, that his townsmen could not help admiring anew the madness of Don Quixote, which, like a whirlpool, had sucked in and swept along with it, the understanding of this poor simpleton.