DON QUIXOTE

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wore as captives if they had been worth anything to them. It was the
advice of some of them to throw us all into the sea wrapped up in a sail;
for their purpose was to trade at some of the ports of Spain, giving
themselves out as Bretons, and if they brought us alive they would be
punished as soon as the robbery was discovered; but the captain (who was
the one who had plundered my beloved Zoraida) said he was satisfied with
the prize he had got, and that he would not touch at any Spanish port,
but pass the Straits of Gibraltar by night, or as best he could, and make
for La Rochelle, from which he had sailed. So they agreed by common
consent to give us the skiff belonging to their ship and all we required
for the short voyage that remained to us, and this they did the next day
on coming in sight of the Spanish coast, with which, and the joy we felt,
all our sufferings and miseries were as completely forgotten as if they
had never been endured by us, such is the delight of recovering lost
liberty.

It may have been about mid-day when they placed us in the boat, giving us