This was the plan they decided on. They made a bargain with a wagoner, who chanced to pass by that way with a team of oxen, to carry him in the following manner:—
They made a thing like a cage of timber, so big that Don Quixote might sit or lie in it at his ease, and presently Don Fernando, Cardenio, their companions, and the Innkeeper did all, by Master Curate's directions, cover their faces and disguise themselves as well as they could, so that they might seem to Don Quixote to be different persons to any he had seen in the Castle. This being done, they entered silently into the place where he slept, reposing after his recent battles. They went up to him as he was sleeping peacefully, not fearing any such accident, and, laying hold of him forcibly, they tied his hands and feet very strongly, so that when he started out of his sleep he could not move, nor do anything else but stare and wonder at the strange faces that he saw before him.
And immediately he fell into the idea, which his wild imagination had at once suggested to him, that all these strange figures were spirits and phantoms of that enchanted Castle, and he believed that he himself was without doubt enchanted, seeing that he could neither move nor defend himself.
All happened as the Curate who plotted the jest expected; and after they had brought him to the cage, they shut him within, and afterwards nailed the bars thereof so well that they could not easily be broken. Sancho all this time looked on in wonder to see what would happen to his Master.
Then the phantoms mounted him upon their shoulders, and as he was carried out of his chamber door the Barber called out in as terrible a voice as he could muster: 'O Knight of the Rueful Countenance, be not grieved at thine imprisonment, for so it must be that thine adventures be more speedily ended. And thou, O most noble and obedient Squire that ever had sword at girdle, beard on a face, or dent in a nose, let it not dismay thee to see carried away thus the flower of all Knighthood. For I assure thee that all thy wages shall be paid to thee, if thou wilt follow in the steps of this valorous and enchanted Knight. And as I am not allowed to say more, farewell!'