in the company of my lady the duchess; and maybe when he comes back, he
will find the lady Dulcinea's affair ever so much advanced; for I mean in
leisure hours, and at idle moments, to give myself a spell of whipping
without so much as a hair to cover me."

"For all that you must go if it be necessary, my good Sancho," said the
duchess, "for they are worthy folk who ask you; and the faces of these
ladies must not remain overgrown in this way because of your idle fears;
that would be a hard case indeed."

"In the king's name, once more!" said Sancho; "If this charitable work
were to be done for the sake of damsels in confinement or charity-girls,
a man might expose himself to some hardships; but to bear it for the sake
of stripping beards off duennas! Devil take it! I'd sooner see them all
bearded, from the highest to the lowest, and from the most prudish to the
most affected."

"You are very hard on duennas, Sancho my friend," said the duchess; "you
incline very much to the opinion of the Toledo apothecary. But indeed you
are wrong; there are duennas in my house that may serve as patterns of
duennas; and here is my Dona Rodriguez, who will not allow me to say
otherwise."

"Your excellence may say it if you like," said the Rodriguez; "for God
knows the truth of everything; and whether we duennas are good or bad,
bearded or smooth, we are our mothers' daughters like other women; and as
God sent us into the world, he knows why he did, and on his mercy I rely,
and not on anybody's beard."

"Well, Senora Rodriguez, Senora Trifaldi, and present company," said Don