Surprised at this, I called out in a sharper
manner: "I want a shave!"

The barber, with a callous indifference to all
precedent, remained unmoved.

I fancied he must be deaf, and next time
concentrated all the power of my lungs—which
would have otherwise been diffused over a whole
sentence—into a most emphatic pronunciation
of one word: "Shave!!"

This unwonted firmness of policy produced its
effect, and the barber turned towards me.

He was a tall young man, slender but well
built, tolerably good looking, with a dark moustache,
but without whiskers or beard; his eyes
were large and well opened, but appeared, as he
first looked towards me, as if they saw nothing
of me, or my beard, or anything else. One
would have supposed that he had never heard of
shaving before.

I thought all this very queer; but still supposing
that he must be deaf, I put my hands
to my mouth, so as to form a natural speaking-trumpet,
and bawled out as loudly as I could:

"I want a—shave! And please to—make
haste! I have a pressing—engagement!"

In a moment his eyes flashed with a strange
light. Advancing towards me with a bound,
he seized a chair, set it down with most unnecessary
violence opposite to mine, threw himself
into it, and, leaning forward with his hands
on his thighs, eyed me over, from the crown of the
head to the sole of the foot, and back again, and
said, as if I had made a most extraordinary
request: "You want to be shaved?"

I was beginning to be alarmed at all this, and
only thought now of beating a retreat; so, taking
out my watch, I said: "Well—a—I did think
of it; but I see I have not time now. Good
morning." And I rose to go away.

But the barber rose also; and, pressing me
back into the chair by main force, stood over
me with one hand on each of my shoulders,
whilst I looked up at him in utter terror and
astonishment.

"You came into this shop," said he; "you
came into this shop, to be shaved?"

"Ye—yes," was all I could stammer out.

"And by me?"

"Well, I—I suppose so."

"Then baste me!" cried he, "but I'll do it!"

Stepping to the door, he locked it in the
most determined manner, and put the key into
the pocket of his light linen jacket.

I rather take credit to myself that I did not
faint away at once; but that, on the contrary, I
began to consider my chances of escape. The
barber was certainly mad, but perhaps I might
be able to pacify him, and induce him to let me
go; or perhaps some other customer might
come in. Surely somebody would come! I
looked through the window, but the street was
quiet and still. A dog lay basking in the sun;
a horse seemed to be going to sleep where he
was tied to the door of a public-house next to
Julia's dwelling; but scarcely anybody passed,
and nobody came to be shaved.

The barber went to the little fireplace, took
up a pot of soapsuds, and stirred them round
with a savage earnestness which I have never
seen equalled, and then stropped a razor with
such ferocity that I thought my last hour
was come. So intent did he appear on this
operation, that I rose from my chair with the
half-formed resolution of disregarding the danger
of broken glass, and making a spring slap
through the window into the street. But the
barber was on me like a tiger, and dashed the
shaving-brush, full of lather, into my face,
with such violence as to knock me back into my
seat, to stifle a scream in which I was about to
lift up my voice, and to make me splutter and
cough for a considerable period.

When I had somewhat recovered, I saw the
barber again seated in the chair opposite to me;
and when our eyes met, he said: "Ah, you
tremble! Say, do you doubt my skill?"

"Oh no; oh dear no; quite the contrary,"
I replied.

"Do you see this arm?" He rolled up his
sleeve. "Does it look muscular?"

"Oh, very, very muscular," I gasped,
"exceedingly muscular." And so it did.

"Do you see this razor? Is it keen?"

"Very keen indeed," I replied, with a shudder.

"Do you doubt its ability to shave you?"

"Oh no; oh dear no," I replied.

"Then is it, after all, my skill?" he cried, in a
voice of thunder. "Is it my skill that you doubt?"

"My dear sir," said I, in my most blandishing
manner, "not at all, not at all. I assure
you I have the utmost confidence in your skill;
but time, my dear sir, time." There was not
much time to spare if I was to be married,
instead of murdered, that fine morning.

"Time!" cried the barber, with a dreadful flourish
of his razor, "time was made for slaves!"

There was something reassuring in this last
observation, which I remembered to have heard
at a convivial meeting. Fancying that the barber
might not be wholly devoid of human sympathy,
I determined to tell him on what errand I was
bound. I said, in as wheedling and insinuating
a manner as I could, and with an attempt to
appear jocose, which, I think, was highly creditable
to me under the circumstances: "My dear
sir, the fact is, between you and me and the post,
that I am on my way to be married, and that it
is time for me to be at church. Ha, ha! I am
sure I need not remind a gentleman who is, no
doubt, a favourite with the sex, that, when a lady's
in the case——Ha, ha!" I rubbed my hands
in a manner intended to be expressive of perfect
ease and cheerfulness, and again rose to depart.

But my appeal did not produce the effect I had
intended; for the barber started up, and waved
the glittering razor in my face in such very close
proximity to my nose that I dropped again into
the chair. He then went stamping and striding
about the shop, shouting: "Going to be married!
Going to swear a peace! False blood to
false blood joined! Rash mortal, why did you
remind me of marriage? Oh, lost, lost Jemima!"
Taking a cheap china ornament from the
mantelpiece, he dashed it to the floor, and deliberately
crunched each separate fragment into powder
under the heel of his boot. And whilst