'Lord a' mercy!' cried the poor Barber, half beside himself. 'Is it possible that so many honourable men should say that this is no basin but a helmet? It is a thing to strike with amazement a whole University, be they never so wise. Enough; if this basin is a helmet, then must the pack-saddle be a horse's trappings.'
'To me it looks like a pack-saddle,' said Don Quixote, 'but I have already said I do not meddle with that matter.'
'Whether it be a pannel or not,' said the Curate, 'it is but for Don Quixote to say, for in these matters of Knighthood, all these gentlemen and myself bow to his knowledge.'
'Sirs,' said Don Quixote, 'so many and strange are the things that have befallen me in this Castle these two times I have lodged here, that it would be rash in me to pronounce a judgment in the matter. To those who say this is a basin and no helmet I have made my answer, but whether this be a pannel or the furniture of a horse I will leave it to others to decide.'
To those who knew Don Quixote's madness this was a matter of much laughter and good sport, but to the four travellers who had arrived that morning, and who were officers of justice, and soldiers of the Holy Brotherhood, it seemed the greatest folly in the world.
But he that was most of all beside himself with wrath was the Barber, whose basin they had transformed before his face into the helmet of Mambrino, and whose pannel, he felt sure, would now be turned into the rich furniture and equipage of a great horse.
Those who were in the secret laughed heartily to see Don Fernando go up and down taking the opinion of this man and that, whispering in their ear that they might give their verdict to him in secret.
And after he had gone round to all those who knew Don Quixote, he said to the Barber in a loud voice: 'The truth is, good fellow, that I grow weary of asking so many opinions, for I no sooner ask what I want to know than they answer me that it is mere madness to say that this is the pannel of an ass, but rather is it the furniture of a horse, yes and of a chief horse of service.'
'May I never go to heaven,' said the poor distracted Barber, 'if you be not all deceived! It is a pannel and no horse's trappings. But the law takes it from me, and so farewell to it.'
The Barber's simplicity caused no less laughter than the follies of Don Quixote, who said: 'There is now no more to be done than for every one to take his own.'