'What do you think now, gentlemen,' said the barber, 'of what these gentles say, when they want to make out that this is a helmet?
' 'And whoever says the contrary,' said Don Quixote, 'I will let him know he lies if he is a knight, and if he is a squire that he lies again a thousand times.
' Our own barber, who was present at all this, and understood Don Quixote’s humour so thoroughly, took it into his head to back up his delusion and carry on the joke for the general amusement; so addressing the other barber he said: 'Señor barber, or whatever you are, you must know that I belong to your profession too, and have had a licence to practise for more than twenty years, and I know the implements of the barber craft, every one of them, perfectly well; and I was likewise a soldier for some time in the days of my youth, and I know also what a helmet is, and a morion, and a headpiece with a visor, and other things pertaining to soldiering, I meant to say to soldiers’ arms; and I say—saving better opinions and always with submission to sounder judgments—that this piece we have now before us, which this worthy gentleman has in his hands, not only is no barber’s basin, but is as far from being one as white is from black, and truth from falsehood; I say, moreover, that this, although it is a helmet, is not a complete helmet.
' 'Certainly not,' said Don Quixote, 'for half of it is wanting, that is to say the beaver. ' 'It is quite true,' said the curate, who saw the object of his friend the barber; and Cardenio, Don Fernando and his companions agreed with him, and even the Judge, if