I like for strangers to stop me and ask me how's everything up at
East Aurora. In short, I like it long."
"Yes, sir," said the barber, "quite so, sir; but it's very long,
particularly here in the back--it covers your coat collar."
"Indeed?" said Frisbee. "You say it covers my coat collar?"
"Yes, sir," said the barber. "You can't see the coat collar at
all."
"Have you got a good sharp pair of shears there?" said Frisbee.
"Oh, yes, sir," said the barber.
"All right then," said Frisbee; "cut the collar off."
But not all of us, as I said before, have this ready gift of parry
and thrust that distinguishes my friend Frisbee. Mostly we weakly
surrender. Or if we refuse to surrender, demanding just a shave
by itself and nothing else, what then follows? In my own case,
speaking personally, I know exactly what follows. I do not like
to have any powder dabbed on my face when I am through shaving.
I believe in letting the bloom of youth show through your skin,
providing you have any bloom of youth to do so. I always take
pains to state my views in this regard at least twice during the
operation of being shaved--once at the start when the barber has
me all lathered up, with soapsuds dripping from the flanges of my
shell-like ears and running down my neck, and once again toward
the close of the operation, when he has laid aside his razor and
is sousing my defenseless features in a liquid that smells and
tastes a good deal like those scented pink blotters they used to
give away at drug-stores to advertise somebody's cologne.
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