"
The wooden chair is next referred to, and then it is stated:--
"Mouth, nose, and cheeks, the lather hides:
Light, smooth, and swift, the razor glides."
Old barbers' shops had their regulations in poetry and prose. Forfeits
used to be enforced for breaches of conduct as laid down in laws which
were exhibited in a conspicuous manner, and might be read while the
customer was awaiting his turn for attention at the hands of the knight
of the razor. Forfeits had to be paid for such offences as the
following:--
For handling the razors,
For talking of cutting throats,
For calling hair-powder flour,
For meddling with anything on the shop-board.
Shakespeare alludes to this custom in "Measure for Measure," Act v. sc.
1, as follows:--
"The strong statutes
Stand like the forfeits in a barber's shop,
As much in mock as mark."
[Illustration: William Shakespeare (the Stratford Portrait).]
Half a century ago there was hanging a code of laws in a barber's shop
in Stratford-on-Avon, which the possessor mounted when he was an
apprentice some fifty years previously.
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