Master Nicholas, the barber from La Mancha, now decides to maintain the joke, but because of his long professional experience, he says, and because he served in the army, he is an expert on all pieces of barber equipment and knows very well what a helmet looks like. Beyond a doubt, Don Quixote holds a helmet although with its beaver missing and not a barber's basin. The curate chimes in with a similar opinion. But as to whether the packsaddle is a packsaddle or indeed a horse's trappings, the curate continues, let the matter be secretly voted on by the entire company. Everyone is amused at these remarks; the barber thinks that they are all madmen. At this point, some troopers of the Holy Brotherhood who have just entered the courtyard participate in the dispute. "This is as much a packsaddle as my father is my father!" shouts one man. Don Quixote attacks him for the lie, and a mad scene of fighting and disputing involves everyone in the courtyard. After everyone is somewhat calmed down, the troopers read aloud their warrant for the arrest of the man who freed the galley slaves. Don Quixote scoffs at their simplicity to imagine a knight-errant bounded by the rules of common jurisprudence.
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