The Barcelona Galley Adventure and Ana Félix’s Rescue joins a comic prank aboard the galleys to an unexpected capture, a revelation of identity, and a family reunion shaped by exile. When the pursuit of a brigantine brings its young captain before the authorities, the apparent corsair is revealed as Ana Félix, a Christian Morisco. Her account explains how she came to be at sea, while the arrival of Ricote transforms a threatened execution into a reunion and a new attempt to recover Don Gaspar Gregorio, still in Algiers.

The Galley Visit and Its Comic Prelude

That afternoon in Barcelona, Don Antonio Moreno and two friends accompanied Don Quixote and Sancho Panza to the galleys. The Valencian gentleman commanding them received Don Quixote with elaborate ceremony: awnings were struck, clarions sounded, and a skiff furnished with crimson velvet carpets and cushions brought him aboard. The leading galley fired its gun as he mounted, and the crew saluted him. The welcome treats Don Quixote as the celebrated knight he imagines himself to be, while also making the practical routines of naval life part of the spectacle.

Sancho’s reception turns quickly from honor to bewilderment. A sailor, prepared in advance, lifted him and passed him rapidly from bench to bench, hand to hand, until the crew deposited him on the poop, bruised and breathless. Don Quixote asked whether this was a customary welcome for first-time visitors and made clear he had no wish to repeat it. The crew then lowered and raised the yard with a loud clatter, and the galley began to move. Watching the synchronized oars and the boatswain urging the rowers on, Sancho mistook the scene for a kind of infernal torment. Don Quixote connected the rowers’ suffering to the lashes Sancho was supposed to endure to disenchant Dulcinea; the exchange briefly brings the story’s comic enchantment alongside the physical labor of galley service.

The Pursuit and the Captive’s Disclosure

A signal from the shore interrupted their visit: an oared vessel had been sighted to the west. The general suspected an Algerian corsair brigantine and dispatched galleys to intercept it, dividing his forces so that it could not easily escape. The brigantine had about fourteen or fifteen banks of oars. When the galleys caught up, two drunken Turks aboard fired muskets and killed two soldiers. The brigantine slipped beneath the oars of the pursuing galley, but the fleet regrouped and captured it, bringing roughly six-and-thirty people back to shore.

The general intended to punish the captives, especially the vessel’s rais, or captain, for the deaths. The young rais stood out among the prisoners, and the Viceroy of Barcelona questioned him before the sentence was carried out. Asked whether he was a Turk, a Moor, or a renegade, the prisoner answered that he was a Christian woman. The disclosure altered the meaning of the capture: the apparent corsair captain was not the person the authorities had supposed, and the viceroy agreed to hear the account before deciding her fate.

Ana Félix’s Account of Exile and Separation

The prisoner identified herself as Ana Félix, born to Morisco parents. She said that her Christian faith was genuine, but that it had not protected her from expulsion: two uncles had taken her to Barbary against her will, disregarding her protests that she was Christian. Her father, who had anticipated the expulsion, had left earlier to seek a refuge for the family. Before departing, he hid valuable pearls, precious stones, and money in a place known only to Ana, instructing her not to touch the cache unless the family was expelled before his return.

In Algiers, the ruler learned of Ana’s beauty and the buried wealth. She told him where the treasure was and said it could be recovered if she returned to Spain. Her companion Don Gaspar Gregorio had followed her into exile, joining the Moriscoes and making use of his knowledge of their language. When the ruler sought to see Gregorio, Ana represented him as a woman and dressed him in Moorish women’s clothing. The ruler, intending to send him to the Grand Signor, placed him in the care of women of rank. Ana’s account thus revealed that Gregorio was alive, but separated from her and in danger in Algiers.

The brigantine’s voyage to Spain was supposed to bring Ana and a Spanish renegade ashore in Christian dress. The renegade, whom Ana believed to be secretly Christian, wanted to remain in Spain. The two Turks aboard instead pursued a possible prize, fearing that a landing might expose the vessel to the galleys. Their decision led to the interception and the deaths that brought Ana before the general. She ended her account by distinguishing herself from the offense of the crew and asking to be allowed to die as a Christian. Moved by her appeal, the viceroy loosened her bonds and sought to prevent her execution.

Ricote’s Recognition and the Decision to Spare Her

As Ana finished speaking, an elderly pilgrim who had come aboard with the viceroy recognized her as his daughter and identified himself as Ricote. Sancho recognized Ricote in turn: he had met him on the day he left his governorship. Ana, now unbound, embraced her father. Ricote explained that he had left his homeland to find refuge abroad, settled in Germany, and later returned in pilgrim’s dress with other German pilgrims to search for Ana and retrieve the buried treasure. He had found the treasure, but not his daughter, until this unexpected encounter.

Sancho confirmed that he knew Ricote and that Ana was indeed his daughter, while declining to vouch for the other details Ricote had given about his travels and intentions. His recognition supplies independent confirmation of their relationship without resolving every question surrounding Ricote’s return. The general then abandoned his oath to take Ana’s life, moved by the family’s distress. The viceroy also persuaded him not to execute the two Turks, judging their conduct to have been rash rather than deliberate defiance. The immediate outcome is therefore a reprieve for Ana and the other prisoners whose punishment had seemed imminent.

A Rescue Planned, Not Completed

The reunion did not end the danger facing the family. Don Gaspar Gregorio remained in Algiers, where he had been left in women’s clothing and under the protection of Moorish ladies. Ricote offered more than two thousand ducats in pearls and gems toward a plan to bring him back. The renegade proposed returning in a small vessel of about six banks, rowed by Christians; he claimed to know where and when to land, and which house held Gregorio. Although the general and viceroy hesitated to entrust Christian rowers to him, Ana vouched for the renegade, and Ricote offered to pay a ransom if the rowers were not recovered.

The authorities accepted this proposal as the best available plan, but the episode does not show Gregorio’s rescue taking place. The viceroy went ashore, while Don Antonio Moreno took Ana and Ricote into his home and was asked to receive them generously. The adventure therefore closes on a qualified reprieve: Ana and her father are together and sheltered, but the effort to reunite her with Gregorio still lies ahead. Its movement from staged galley entertainment to a real capture makes the reversal especially sharp: Sancho’s mock ordeal is followed by the disclosure of a family’s actual displacement, separation, and precarious hope of return.