So They Learn.
How does a barber learn to shave customers? He might practise on his own face for ever, and yet be unable to scrape the lather from another's cheeks without cutting him.
The above query was put to an individual following the calling indicated. Came the answer :
" We practise at first on a wooden block, fashioned to roughly represent a human face and head. This is duly lathered as would be a real living customer, and the budding Figaro then carefully proceeds to shave it.
Tiny shavings taken out of the wood reveal to the operator the place where, if the face had been that of a living man, the skin would have been cut or scraped. After a' few weeksj perhaps* of such re-
hearsing .the assistant is allowed to invite in a few down-at-heel victims who will cheerfully run the risk of a- cut or two in. order to get a shave for 'nothing. That, at" any rate, is how I learned to shave. Some barbers do the shaving for workhouses, etc., and new-comers serving with them have often. ' got their hand in ' on the paupers' chins."
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/OW18990511.2.212.2
Bibliographic details
Otago Witness, Issue 2359, 11 May 1899, Page 60
Word Count
191So They Learn. Otago Witness, Issue 2359, 11 May 1899, Page 60
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