Mambrino’s Helmet.  In pt.  I. iii. 8 we are told that the galley-slaves set free by Don Quixote assaulted him with stones, and “snatching the basin from his head, broke it to pieces.”  In bk. iv. 15 we find this basin quite whole and sound, the subject of a judicial inquiry, the question being whether it was a helmet or a barber’s basin.  Sancho (ch. 11) says, he “picked it up, bruised and battered, intending to get it mended;” but he says, “I broke it to pieces,” or, according to one translator, “broke it into a thousand pieces.”  In bk. iv. 8 we are told that Don Quixote “came from his chamber armed cap-a-pie, with the barber’s basin on his head.”

Sancho’s Ass.  We are told (pt.  I. iii. 9) that Gines de Passamonte “stole Sancho’s ass.”  Sancho laments the loss with true pathos, and the knight condoles with him.  But soon afterwards Cervantes says:  “He [Sancho] jogged on leisurely upon his ass after his master.”

Sancho’s Great-coat.  Sancho Panza, we are told, left his wallet behind in the Crescent Moon tavern, where he was tossed in a blanket, and put the provisions left by the priests in his great-coat (ch. 5).  The galley-slaves robbed him of “his great-coat, leaving only his doublet” (ch. 8), but in the next chapter (9) we find “the victuals had not been touched,” though the rascals “searched diligently for booty.”  Now, if the food was in the great-coat, and the great-coat was stolen, how is it that the victuals remained in Sancho’s possession untouched?

Sancho’s Wallet.  We are told that Sancho left his wallet by mistake at the tavern where he was blanket-tossed (ch. 5), but in ch. 9, when he found the portmanteau, “he crammed the gold and linen into his wallet.”—­Pt.  I. iii.

To make these oversights more striking, the author says, when Sancho found the portmanteau, “he entirely forgot the loss of his wallet, his great-coat, and of his faithful companion and servant Dapple” (the ass).

Supper.  Cervantes makes the party at the Crescent tavern eat two suppers in one evening.  In ch. 5 the curate orders in supper, and “after supper” they read the story of Fatal Curiosity.  In ch. 12 we are told “the cloth was laid [again] for supper,” and the company sat down to it, quite forgetting that they had already supped.—­Pt.  I. iv.

CHAMBERS’S ENCYCLOPAEDIA states that “the fame of Beaumarchais rests on his two operas, Le Barbier de Seville (1755) and Le Mariage de Figaro.”  Every one knows that Mozart composed the opera of Figaro (1786), and that Casti wrote the libretto.  The opera of Le Barbier de Seville, or rather Il Barbiere di Siviglia, was composed by Rossini, in 1816.  What Beaumarchais wrote was two comedies, one in four acts and the other in five acts.—­Art.  “Beaumarchais.”

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL.  We are told, in a paper entitled “Coincidences,” that Thursday has proved a fatal day with the Tudors, for on that day died Henry VIII., Edward VI., Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth.  If this had been the case it would, indeed, have been startling; but what are the facts?  Henry VIII. died on Friday, January 28, 1547, and Elizabeth died on Monday, March 24, 1603.—­Rymer, Foedera, xv.