Taking the opportunity of following his host out of the
room, he asked for an explanation of his conduct, and said that he
deemed it an insult to be seated in such inferior company. Amazed at the
charge, Sir Theophilus assured the dramatist that every one of the
guests was a gentleman, and that they were his particular friends.
Farquhar was not satisfied. "I am certain," he said, "that the little
humpbacked man who sat opposite me is a barber who shaved me this
morning." The host returned to the room and related the story which he
had just heard. "Ay, yes," replied the guest, who was a well-born
gentleman, "I can make the matter clear. It was I who was in the
barber's shop this morning, and as Farquhar seemed in such a hurry, and
the barber was out, I shaved him."
The works of the old dramatists and other publications contain allusions
to barbers' music. It was the practice, as we have said, when a
customer was waiting for his turn in a barber's shop to pass his time
playing on the gittern. Dekker mentions a "barber's cittern for every
serving-man to play upon.
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