“There’s no road so smooth but it has some hole or hindrance in it,” said Sancho; “in other houses they cook beans, but in mine it’s by the potful; 553 madness will have more followers and hangers-on than sound sense; but if there be any truth in the common saying, that to have companions in trouble gives some relief, I may take consolation from you, inasmuch as you serve a master as crazy as my own.”

“Crazy but valiant,” replied he of the Grove, “and more roguish than crazy or valiant.”

“Mine is not that,” said Sancho; “I mean he has nothing of the rogue in him; on the contrary, he has the soul of a pitcher; 554 he has no thought of doing harm to anyone, only good to all, nor has he any malice whatever in him; a child might persuade him that it is night at noonday; and for this simplicity I love him as the core of my heart, and I can’t bring myself to leave him, let him do ever such foolish things.”