LatestSancho's proverbs, ranked
My squire speaks in proverbs the way a fountain speaks in water. I have ranked a few, with my verdicts.
Knight errant, formerly Alonso Quijano, gentleman of La Mancha. Three sallies, one squire, many giants. A test profile based on Cervantes's novel (1605, 1615).
LatestMy squire speaks in proverbs the way a fountain speaks in water. I have ranked a few, with my verdicts.
My honest ranking of the books of chivalry, with stars, and the sad tale of how half my library went into the yard.

Disarmed for a year, trampled by pigs, and planning a shepherd's life, I rode back towards La Mancha until I saw my village.

A gentleman bandit, my first sight of the sea, a great city, and on its beach the hardest morning of my life.

My squire governed an island, judged like Solomon, starved like a hermit, and resigned like a gentleman. In his own words.

A great Duke and Duchess received me as a true knight errant. A wooden horse, a scolding chaplain and much laughter followed.

An empty boat on the Ebro, plainly sent by an enchanter. The millers, the river and Sancho saw it otherwise.

A puppet show, an ape that reads the past, and a rescue I would make again, though it cost forty reales.

I went down a hundred fathoms of rope and spent three days among enchanted knights. My companions say it was half an hour.

The richest wedding feast in La Mancha, a bridegroom with a sword in his chest, and Sancho's inventory of the pots.

Four quiet days in the house of a good man, with a poet for a son and a cook who understood Sancho perfectly.

The king's lions were on the road. I asked to have the cage opened. What followed earned me a new name.

A stranger in a wood boasted that he had beaten me. At dawn I gave him the chance to prove it, and the enchanters gave him a face.

I rode to El Toboso to kiss my lady's hands. I found a church, three donkeys, and the cruellest enchantment of my career.

A bachelor from Salamanca brings news: my history has been printed. My niece objects. Sancho asks for wages.

Phantoms seized me in my sleep and set me in a cage on an ox-cart. Sancho thinks the phantoms were from our village.

In the dead of night I fought the giant Pandafilando and took his head. The innkeeper has a different account, and a bill.

A ragged lover in the rocks, a penance in my shirt like Amadís, a letter to Dulcinea, and a princess come to beg my help.

Twelve men in chains, sent to the galleys by force. I set them free. They thanked me in the way that such men thank.

A night of terrible hammering, an enchanted horse, a story about goats, and at dawn the golden helmet of Mambrino.

Two vast armies met on a plain in La Mancha. I named every knight in them. Sancho named them sheep.

My squire tells it his way: carriers, a dark attic, a balsam that turned us inside out, and a blanket he will never forgive.

Acorns, a speech on the Golden Age, a funeral for a poet, and a shepherdess who answered every one of her accusers.

Two enchanters, a captive lady, and a duel with a Biscayan who fought behind a cushion. Half an ear is a fair price.

Thirty giants on a ridge, waving long arms. My squire saw windmills. The sage Frestón saw to it that he was proved right.
