A Hairdresser's Experience in High Life/Chapter 1
THE AUTHOR'S APPEAL.
It may perhaps be considered presumptive for one in my humble sphere of life to think of writing a book; but, influenced by the earnest persuasions of many ladies and gentlemen, I have at last concluded that I might just as well note down a few of my experiences for their amusement as not.
The unlettered of all ages have numbered in their ranks many with sufficient observation and intelligence to have written more entertaining books than many which have emanated from cultivated pens, had they only possessed the courage to tell what they knew in simple, plain language—could they only remember that the mouths of babes and sucklings have, in other days, perfected the praise of the mightiest. Those days may come again.
The physician writes his diary, and doubtless his means of discovering the hidden mysteries of life are great. The clergyman, whose calling inspires the deepest confidence, and into whose ear the tales of sorrow are unreservedly breathed, sends forth his diary to an eager world, and other innumerable chroniclers of fireside life have existed; but the hair-dresser will yield rivalship to none in this regard. If domestic bitterness and joy, and all the heart-emotions that exist, cannot be discovered by her, she defies all the rest of the world to find them out.
My avocation calls me into the upper classes of society almost exclusively; and there reign as many elements of misery as the world can produce. No one need go into alleys to hunt up wretchedness; they can find it in perfection among the rich and fashionable of every land and nation. Oh! if tesselated hearths and satin tapestries could speak, what tales of agony they might tell! If the marble statues that adorn the riches of lordly mansions could open their mouths, how would they outrival all poetry and romance in the incidents they could proclaim! and could the nuptial couch, with its silken hangings, unfold its memories, could we bear to listen to its disclosures? But nowhere do hearts betray themselves more unguardedly than in the private boudoir, where the hair-dresser's mission makes her a daily attendant. Why, then, should not the hair-dresser write, as well as the physician and clergyman? She will tell her story in simpler language; but it will be none the less truthful, none the less strange.