"
"But what do you intend for your sign?" inquired the cleric.
"The 'Jolly Barber,' if it please your reverence, with a razor in one
hand and a full pot in the other."
"Well," rejoined Swift, "in that case there can be no great difficulty
in supplying you with a suitable inscription." Taking up a pen he
instantly wrote the following couplet, which was duly painted on the
sign and remained there for many years:--
"Rove not from pole to pole, but step in here,
Where nought excels the shaving but--the beer."
Another barber headed his advertisement with a parody on a couplet from
Goldsmith as follows:--
"Man wants but little beard below,
Nor wants that little long."
A witty Parisian hairdresser on one of the Boulevards put up a sign
having on it a portrait of Absalom dangling by his hair from a tree, and
Joab piercing his body with a spear. Under the painting was the
following terse epigram:--
"Passans, contemplez le malheur
D'Absalom pendu par la nuque;
Il aurait evite ce malheur,
S'il eut porte une perruque.
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