f Jasmin amply illustrates this truth. Here was a
young man born in the depths of poverty. In his early life he suffered
the most cruel needs of existence. When he became a barber's apprentice,
he touched the lowest rung of the ladder of reputation; but he had at
least learned the beginnings of knowledge.

He knew how to read, and when we know the twenty-four letters of the
alphabet, we may learn almost everything that we wish to know. From that
slight beginning most men may raise themselves to the heights of
moral and intellectual worth by a persevering will and the faithful
performance of duty.

At the same time it must be confessed that it is altogether different
with poetical genius. It is not possible to tell what unforeseen and
forgotten circumstances may have given the initial impulse to a poetic
nature. It is not the result of any fortuitous impression, and still
less of any act of the will.

It is possible that Jasmin may have obtained his first insight into
poetic art during his solitary evening walks along the banks of the
Garonne, or from the nightingales singing overhead, or from his chanting
in the choir when a child. Perhaps the 'Fables of Florian' kindled the
poetic fire within him; at all events they may have acted as the first
stimulus to his art of rhyming. They opened his mind to the love
of nature, to the pleasures of country life, and the joys of social
intercourse.

There is nothing in the occupation of a barber incompatible with the
cultivation of poetry. Folez, the old German poet, was a barber, as well
as the still more celebrated Burchiello, of Florence, whose sonnets
are still admired because of the purity of their style. Our own Allan
Ramsay, author of 'The Gentle Shepherd,' spent some of his early years
in the same occupation.

In southern and Oriental life the barber plays an important part. In the
Arabian tales he is generally a shrewd, meddling, inquisitive fellow. In
Spain and Italy the barber is often the one brilliant man in his town;
his shop is the place where gossip circulates, and where many a pretty
intrigue is contrived.

Men of culture are often the friends of barbers. Buffon trusted to
his barber for all the news of Montbard. Moliere spent many long and
pleasant hours with the barber of Pezenas. Figaro, the famous barber of
Seville, was one of the most perfect prototypes of his trade. Jasmin was
of the same calling as Gil Bias, inspired with the same spirit, and full
o