Don Quixote: Novel Summary: Book 1, Part 23-Book 1, Part 24

Select a Chapter:

Book 1, Part 23-Book 1, Part 24

Book 1, Part 23: Still at the "enchanted" inn, Don Quixote decides to spend the night on guard duty outside.  Maritones and the innkeeper's daughter plot to play a clever trick on the knight-errant, however, tying him up through a window.  As always, he attributes his dilemma to the work of enchanters. 
Later, Sancho gets into a scuffle with the barber over a certain basin.  This starts a rather large battle, with the Don in the thick of things himself.  Soon the Holy Brotherhood tries to arrest Don Quixote, though the noble knight asserts to them in no uncertain terms that knights-errant such as himself subscribe to a higher law, and thus can't be prosecuted by human judges.  Luckily, the curate persuades the church officials not to arrest the Don, considering his madness.
Book 1, Part 24: Don Quixote tells of his plans to continue his noble calling.  Sancho tells his master, however, that Dorothea is no queen.  An argument ensues, but eventually dies down.  Seeing their chance to bring him back to reality, Quixote's "friends" place him in a cage to transport him back to their home village.  Sancho even tells his master that this whole thing has just been a game.  This sparks an argument over enchantments. 
Though they encounter a religious procession, in which Quixote demands that the churchmen release a statue of the Virgin Mary from their possession, the knight-errant isn't successful, and ends up injured and insulted.  Finally he is brought home and put into his bed.