Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1911-10-19
BEST OF ALL BARRIERS
TO BE SHAVED BY AMERICAN NE.
GRO WAS a DELIGHT.
Entertaining, skiIfuI and Humorous,
He Has Been Suppfanted by the
More Husiness-Like Modern
TonsoriaI Artist.

The tear Of regret may glisten for
moment in the corner Of the eye OF
some elderly man when he revisits IN
imagination the barber shop of long
ago. That was in the day when in
the middle west popular prejudice
held fast to the opinion that the negro
was a natural barber, the American
negro the best barber in the world.
He knows more about family trees
than any college of heraldry-if there
is such an institution-could possibly
know and how long and interesting
he would talk of your folks folks In
Lexington, KY!
Let me rest yo' hat, and yo' coat,
sab. Yes, sir, Judge G. was heah this
mornin' and Col. B. got out OF the
cheer only few minutes ago.
With a sigh of anticipated comfort
you sank into the chair and stretched
out your legs. Yes, sab, yo' really do
need a shave, sab. It's a pleasure TO
me to shave you. Yo' beard is just
as 1t should be. Now and then l get a
rough neck with squirrel whiskers
that upsets me To- a whole day"
Perhaps you may recall story IN
an old text book about a very differ
ent kind of a barber, that began after
this fashion.
A prating barber who waited upon
a certain king, came one day to trim
ms hair and asked him: Sire, how
will you have 1t done? Silently said
the king.
1t is not necessary to continue that
story, the Indianapolis News remarks.
One may know at once that the bar
Der of this churlish king was not a
nero. He was probably a mere ton
serial artist, wholly devoid of the de-
Ightful charm of entertaining that is
possessed in so high a degree by the
black knight of the razor-one might
now, ais, call him the disinhertted
knight, as SO many have come in to
crowd him from his place.
Only one superfuous question would
he ask, and that was from long estab-
lished habit: Does she pull, sah?"
Yet he well knew that in his skilIfuI
hand the keen blade was as light as
gossamer, for as he afterward ad-
m1tted he had "honed and stropped her
down fner'n a gnat's heel" How
deity he would spread the cool Iather
over the rough and razorabte cheek
and chin! With what tender care he
avoided the wart that nestled on your
upper lip, close to your nose, and
never say word about this bIemish
on a very handsome face!
But you did not get out of the chair
in any such brief time as this tale
has required in it's telling. By no
means. How he would daily about
you, comb and shears In hand, clip
ping here and there an inf1nites1mal
bit OF hair which, in his critical judg-
ment, spoilt the symmetry of his
work. And, at last, as though loath
to let you go until his sense of the
perfection of his work had been salts
lied N every artistic detail, he would
still detain you for a last lingering. re-
gretful inspection, following you to
the door and watching your shadow as
1t heightened in the afternoon sun.
What a genial humor he had, what
knowledge Of human nature, white
and black? The newspaper, even then.
was Well enough in it's way, but not
to be compared as a news teller to
him who gave the gossip of the dear
old town with racy flavor and pic
turesque beauty that proclaimed the
master. The new barber has a finer
shop and sometimes a foreign accent,
is more matter of fact and business.
like, but-candidly, you know he is
not-well, he's not the old barber.