DON QUIXOTE

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accompanied by such signs of genuine love, might well have conquered a
heart even more free and coy than mine--these were the things that more
than all began to influence me and lead me unawares to my ruin. I called
my waiting-maid to me, that there might be a witness on earth besides
those in Heaven, and again Don Fernando renewed and repeated his oaths,
invoked as witnesses fresh saints in addition to the former ones, called
down upon himself a thousand curses hereafter should he fail to keep his
promise, shed more tears, redoubled his sighs and pressed me closer in
his arms, from which he had never allowed me to escape; and so I was left
by my maid, and ceased to be one, and he became a traitor and a perjured
man.

"The day which followed the night of my misfortune did not come so
quickly, I imagine, as Don Fernando wished, for when desire has attained
its object, the greatest pleasure is to fly from the scene of pleasure. I
say so because Don Fernando made all haste to leave me, and by the
adroitness of my maid, who was indeed the one who had admitted him,