to follow his lead. I watched my
chance when the guard's back was turned, and my bundle followed the
other one into the shirt of the convict.

A minute later the door was unlocked, and we filed into the
barber-shop. Here were more men in convict stripes. They were the
prison barbers. Also, there were bath-tubs, hot water, soap, and
scrubbing-brushes. We were ordered to strip and bathe, each man to
scrub his neighbor's back--a needless precaution, this compulsory
bath, for the prison swarmed with vermin. After the bath, we were each
given a canvas clothes-bag.

"Put all your clothes in the bags," said the guard. "It's no good
trying to smuggle anything in. You've got to line up naked for
inspection. Men for thirty days or less keep their shoes and
suspenders. Men for more than thirty days keep nothing."

This announcement was received with consternation. How could naked men
smuggle anything past an inspection? Only my pal and I were safe. But
it was right here that the convict barbers got in their work. They
passed among the poor newcomers, kindly volunteering to take charge of
their precious little belongings, and promising to return them later
in the day. Those barbers were philanthropists--to hear them talk. As
in the case of Fra Lippo Lippi, never was there such prompt
disemburdening. Matches, tobacco, rice-paper, pipes, knives, money,
everything, flowed into the capacious shirts of the barbers. They
fairly bulged with the spoil, and the guards made believe not to see.
To cut the story short, nothing was ever returned. The barbers never
had any intention of returning what they had taken. They considered it
legitimately theirs. It was the barber-shop graft. There were many
grafts in that prison, as I was to learn; and I, too, was destined to
become a grafter--thanks to my new pal.

There were several chairs, and the barbers worked rapidly. The
quickest shaves and hair-cuts I have ever seen were given in that
shop. The men lathered themselves, and the barbers shaved them at the
rate of a minute to a man. A hair-cut took a trifle longer. In three
minutes the down of eighteen was scraped from my face, and my head was
as smooth as a billiard-ball just sprouting a crop of bristles.
Beards, mustaches, like our clothes and everything, came off. Take my
word for it, we were a villainous-looking gang when they got through
with us. I had not realized before how really altogether bad we were.

Then came the line-up, forty