DON QUIXOTE

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family with which many of the best of the province are connected by
blood; but my untoward fate and the improvidence of my parents, who, I
know not how, were unseasonably reduced to poverty, brought me to the
court of Madrid, where as a provision and to avoid greater misfortunes,
my parents placed me as seamstress in the service of a lady of quality,
and I would have you know that for hemming and sewing I have never been
surpassed by any all my life. My parents left me in service and returned
to their own country, and a few years later went, no doubt, to heaven,
for they were excellent good Catholic Christians. I was left an orphan
with nothing but the miserable wages and trifling presents that are given
to servants of my sort in palaces; but about this time, without any
encouragement on my part, one of the esquires of the household fell in
love with me, a man somewhat advanced in years, full-bearded and
personable, and above all as good a gentleman as the king himself, for he
came of a mountain stock. We did not carry on our loves with such secrecy
but that they came to the knowledge of my lady, and she, not to have any
fuss about it, had us married with the full sanction of the holy mother