essentially an artist--for which reason I liked him more than a little.
He lumbered off one day--I hope to his brier-patch, and to his children,
and to his _confreres_, and to all things excellent and livable and
highly desirable to a bruin.

The Young Russian and The Barber escaped while I was enjoying my little
visit at Orne. The former was an immensely tall and very strong boy of
nineteen or under; who had come to our society by way of solitary
confinement, bread and water for months, and other reminders that to err
is human, etc. Unlike Harree, whom, if anything, he exceeded in strength,
he was very quiet. Everyone let him alone. I "caught water" in the town
with him several times and found him an excellent companion. He taught me
the Russian numerals up to ten, and was very kind to my struggles over 10
and 9. He picked up the cannon-ball one day and threw it so hard that the
wall separating the men's _cour_ from the _cour des femmes_ shook, and a
piece of stone fell off. At which the cannon-ball was taken away from us
(to the grief of its daily wielders, Harree and Fritz) by four perspiring
_plantons_, who almost died in the performance of their highly patriotic
duty. His friend, The Barber, had a little shelf in The Enormous Room,
all tricked out with an astonishing array of bottles, atomizers, tonics,
powders, scissors, razors and other deadly implements. It has always been
a _mystere_ to me that our captors permitted this array of obviously
dangerous weapons when we were searched almost weekly for knives. Had I
not been in the habit of using B.'s safety razor I should probably have
become better acquainted with The Barber. It was not his price, nor yet
his technique, but the fear of contamination which made me avoid these
instruments of hygiene. Not that I shaved to excess. On the contrary, the
Surveillant often, nay bi-weekly (so soon as I began drawing certain
francs from Norton Harjes) reasoned with me upon the subject of
appearance; saying that I was come of a good family, and I had enjoyed