No, for you can't judge by ministers, the
streets are full of them. A Paganini? No, he's not great enough. A
hair-dresser, monsieur, a man who divines your soul and your habits, in
order to dress your hair conformably with your being, that man has all
that constitutes a philosopher--and such he is. See the women! Women
appreciate us; they know our value; our value to them is the conquest
they make when they have placed their heads in our hands to attain a
triumph. I say to you that a hair-dresser--the world does not know
what he is. I who speak to you, I am very nearly all that there is
of--without boasting I may say I am known--Still, I think more might be
done--The execution, that is everything! Ah! if women would only give
me carte blanche!--if I might only execute the ideas that come to me! I
have, you see, a hell of imagination!--but the women don't fall in with
it; they have their own plans; they'll stick their fingers or combs, as
soon as my back is turned, through the most delicious edifices--which
ought to be engraved and perpetuated; for our works, monsieur, last
unfortunately but a few hours. A great hair-dresser, hey! he's like
Careme and Vestris in their careers. (Head a little this way, if you
please, SO; I attend particularly to front faces!) Our profession is
ruined by bunglers who understand neither the epoch nor their art. There
are dealers in wigs and essences who are enough to make one's hair stand
on end; they care only to sell you bottles. It is pitiable! But that's
business. Such poor wretches cut hair and dress it as they can. I, when
I arrived in Paris from Toulouse, my ambition was to succeed the great
Marius, to be a true Marius, to make that name illustrious. I alone,
more than all the four others, I said to myself, 'I will conquer, or
die.' (There! now sit straight, I am going to finish you.) I was the
first to introduce _elegance_; I made my salons the object of curiosity.
I disdain advertisements; what advertisements would have cost, monsieur,
I put into elegance, charm, comfort. Next year I shall have a quartette
in one of the salons to discourse music, and of the best. Yes, we ought
to charm away the ennui of those whose heads we dress. I do not conceal
from myself the annoyances to a client. (Look at yourself!) To have
one's hair dressed is fatiguing, perhaps as much so as posing for one's
portrait. Monsieur knows perhaps that the famous Monsieur Humbolt (I did
the best I could with the