The Third Sally begins with Don Quixote and Sancho Panza leaving their village for El Toboso, an expedition framed as the renewal of their adventures and as a journey to seek Dulcinea of Toboso’s favor. The departure is both a private escape from the household’s attempts to restrain Don Quixote and the opening move in a plan that Samson Carrasco has developed with the curate and barber.

Preparation and Secret Departure

Don Quixote and Samson Carrasco first agree that the expedition will begin in three days. Don Quixote insists that Carrasco keep the plan from the curate, Master Nicholas, his niece, and the housekeeper, fearing they might stop what he regards as a worthy and valiant undertaking. Carrasco promises secrecy and asks Don Quixote to report his fortunes, good or bad, when he can.

In the interval, Don Quixote and Sancho make the preparations they consider necessary. They reconcile after an earlier quarrel, and Carrasco helps arrange the departure. Don Quixote obtains a closed helmet through Carrasco, although it is rusty and mildewed rather than gleaming. Sancho pacifies his wife, Teresa Panza, while Don Quixote reassures his niece and the housekeeper. Their precautions do not prevent the household’s grief: the niece and housekeeper tear at their hair, claw their faces, and lament the departure as though Don Quixote were dead.

At nightfall, the pair slip away without the household knowing. Carrasco is the only person who sees them go; he accompanies them for half a league before returning to the village. Don Quixote rides Rocinante, and Sancho rides Dapple. Sancho carries provisions in his saddlebags and money given by Don Quixote for emergencies. The discreet departure turns a household’s attempted farewell into a clandestine launch for the road.

Carrasco’s Hidden Purpose

The departure is not simply the result of Carrasco’s friendly assistance. The account discloses that he has persuaded Don Quixote to sally forth again with a further purpose in mind, acting on advice from the curate and the barber. That concealed design gives the opening a double character: Carrasco appears as the trusted companion who supplies equipment and escorts the travelers, but his encouragement also serves a scheme whose outcome lies ahead.

Carrasco’s parting words preserve the appearance of friendship. He asks to hear whether the travelers meet good or ill fortune, so that he may share their joy or sorrow; Don Quixote promises to keep him informed. Carrasco then returns home while the knight and squire continue toward El Toboso, carrying with them a promise of correspondence and an undisclosed intervention in their journey.

Omens and the Road to El Toboso

Once Carrasco has left them alone, Rocinante neighs and Dapple sighs. Don Quixote and Sancho take these sounds as favorable omens, but the narrator undercuts the confident reading: Dapple’s sighs and brays are louder than Rocinante’s neighs, prompting Sancho to infer that his own good fortune will surpass his master’s. The history treats that inference with comic reserve, and Sancho’s later stumbling gives the omen a more prosaic measure: falls bring him little beyond a damaged shoe or a broken rib.

Night is drawing in, and Don Quixote says that they will not reach El Toboso by daylight. He is nevertheless determined to go there before beginning another adventure. He believes that Dulcinea’s blessing and generous permission will enable him to bring dangerous undertakings to a successful end, because a knight-errant becomes more valorous when favored by his lady. The journey therefore begins not with a challenge on the road, but with Don Quixote’s conviction that the next phase of his adventures must first pass through the presence, or imagined favor, of Dulcinea.

Narrative Threshold

The chapter’s chronicler marks this departure as the point at which the new adventures and comic episodes are about to begin, directing attention away from Don Quixote’s earlier chivalric exploits and toward those now opening on the road to El Toboso. The framing makes the sally a threshold in the book’s action: the familiar partnership of knight and squire is again in motion, while the destination brings Don Quixote’s devotion to Dulcinea to the foreground and Carrasco’s secret plan waits behind the apparent reunion and farewell.