But at that moment one of the four officers of justice, who had listened to the dispute, full of anger to hear such nonsense seriously spoken, cried out: 'If this be not a planned jest, I cannot understand why men of such intelligence as all these seem to be, should dare to say that this is not a basin nor this a pannel. For indeed it is as very a pannel as my father is my father, and he that hath said or will say anything else must be drunk.'
'Thou liest like a clownish knave,' said Don Quixote. And lifting up his lance, which he always held in his hand, he aimed such a blow at the trooper's pate, that if he had not avoided it, it would have thrown him to the ground.
The lance was broken into splinters by the fall of the blow, and the other troopers, seeing their comrade so misused, cried out for help in the name of the Holy Brotherhood. The Innkeeper, whose duty it was to help all officers of justice, ran for his sword, and stood by to help them. The Barber laid hold of his pannel, and Sancho Panza did the same. Don Quixote set hand to his sword and attacked the troopers, and Cardenio and Don Fernando took his part. The Curate cried out, the Hostess shrieked, the daughter screamed, Maritornes howled, while Dorothea and Lucinda stood frightened and amazed. The Barber battered Sancho, and Sancho pounded him back again, while Don Fernando got one of the troopers at his feet, and belaboured him soundly. The Innkeeper cried aloud for help for the Holy Brotherhood, and all the Inn seemed full of wails, cries, screeches, confusion, fears, terrors, disasters, slashes, buffets, cudgellings, kicks, and the shedding of blood.
In the midst of this chaos, Don Quixote began to imagine that he was plunged up to the ears in the battle of the King Agramante, and he cried aloud in a voice that thundered through the Inn, 'Hold all your hands, put up your swords, and keep the peace, if you wish to continue alive.'
That great and monstrous voice made them all stand still; on which he continued: 'Did I not tell you, Sirs, that this Castle was enchanted, and that some legion of magicians did inhabit it? Note how the discord of King Agramante's Camp is among us, so that we all of us fight, and none know for what. Come, therefore, Master Curate, and make you peace and atonement between us, for I swear that it is a great wrong and pity that so many noblemen as we are here should be slain for so slight causes.'
The Barber was well content that this should be so, by reason that both his beard and his pannel had been torn to pieces, and Sancho was at once obedient to his Master's voice, as became a dutiful servant. As for the troopers, when they learned Don Fernando's rank and position, they were quieted, but they retired from the brawl grumbling, and by no means satisfied with the turn things had taken.
Now it happened that one of these officers—the very one who was so buffeted by Don Fernando—had with him a warrant to take into custody one Don Quixote, who was charged with setting free certain galley slaves. As soon as he remembered this, he must needs try whether the description of Don Quixote tallied with the person before him.
He took from his bosom a scroll of parchment, and reading it very leisurely, for he was no great scholar, at every other word he stared at Don Quixote, and compared the marks of his warrant with those in the Knight's face, and found that without doubt he was the man that was wanted.
No sooner had he made up his mind about this than, holding the warrant in his left hand, he laid hold of Don Quixote's collar with his right so strongly that he could hardly breathe, and cried aloud: 'Aid for the Holy Brotherhood. And that you may see that I am in good earnest, read that warrant, wherein you shall find that this robber of the highways is to be taken into custody.'
The Curate took the warrant, and saw that what the trooper said was true, and that the marks described Don Quixote very nearly.