Sancho cunningly, and keeping his countenance, “if they be curds, good your worship, give them me hither, and I will eat them.  But hold, now I think on it, the devil eat them for me; for he himself must have put them there.  What!  I dare offer to defile your helmet! you must know who dared to do it!  As sure as I am alive, sir, I have got my enchanters too, that owe me a grudge, and plague me as a limb of your worship; and I warrant have put that nasty stuff there on purpose to set you against me, and make you fall foul on my bones.  But I hope they have missed their aim this time, i’ troth!  My master is a wise man, and must needs know that I had neither curds nor milk, nor anything of that kind; and if I had met with curds, I should sooner have put them in my belly than in the helmet.”—­“Well,” said Don Quixote, “there may be something in that.”

The gentleman had observed these passages, and stood amazed, but especially when Don Quixote, having put on the helmet again, fixed himself well in the stirrups, tried whether his sword were loose enough in his scabbard, and rested his lance.  “Now,” cried he, “come what will come; here am I, who dare encounter the devil himself in person.”  By this time the wagon with the flags was come up with them, attended only by the carter, mounted on one of the mules, and another man that sat on the forepart.  Don Quixote making up to them, “Whither go ye, friends?” said he.  “What wagon is this?  What do you convey in it?  And what is the meaning of these flags?”—­“The wagon is mine,” answered the wagoner; “I have there fast two brave lions, which the general of Oran is sending to his majesty, and these colors of our lord the king are to let the people understand that what goes here belongs to him.”—­“And are the lions large?” inquired Don Quixote.—­“Very large,” answered the man at the door of the wagon; “there never came bigger from Afric into Spain.  I am their keeper,” added he, “and have had charge of several others, but I never saw the like of these before.  In the foremost cage is a he-lion and in the other, behind, a lioness.  By this time they are hungry, for they have not eaten to-day; therefore, pray, good sir, ride out of the way, for we must make haste to get to the place where we intend to feed them.”—­“What!” said Don Quixote, with a smile, “lion whelps against me!  Against me those puny beasts!  And at this time of day?  Well, I will make those gentlemen that sent their lions this way know whether I am a man to be scared with lions.  Get off, honest fellow; and since you are the keeper, open their cages, and let them both out; for, maugre and in despite of those enchanters that have sent them to try me, I will make the creatures know, in the midst of this very field, who Don Quixote de la Mancha is.”—­“So,” thought the gentleman to himself, “now has our poor knight discovered who he is; the curds, I find, have softened his skull, and mellowed his brains.”