[La Vende by Anthony Trollope]@TWC D-Link bookLa Vende CHAPTER I 15/15
He was engaged to be married, he said, to a young girl at Angers, who had many lovers; she had preferred him for the beauty of his hair: if he returned back bald, he knew that he would be rejected.
Chapeau for a time was moved, but the patriot and the royalist triumphed over the man, and Jacques, turning away his face on which a tear was gleaming, with a wave of his hand motioned the young man to the chair. Insult was added to injury, for the Chevalier stood at the door with a brush, and a large jar of red paint, and as each man went out of the room, Arthur made a huge cross upon his bare pate.
The poor wretches in their attempt to rub it off, merely converted the cross into a red patch, and as they were made to walk across the market-place with their bald red heads, they gave rise to shouts of laughter, not only from the royalists, but from the inhabitants of the town. For three days the shaving went on, and as the men became experienced from practice, it was conducted with wonderful rapidity.
At last, the prisoners were all deprived of their hair, and set at liberty--a temporary bridge was thrown across the Loire, near the Green Cross, and the men were allowed to march over.
As soon as they found themselves on the other side of the Loire, they were free. "Come, my bald pates, come my knights of the ruddy scalp," said Jacques, standing at the corner of the bridge as they passed over, "away with you to the Convention; and if your friends like your appearance, send them to Saumur, and they shall be shaved close, and the barber shall ask for no fee; but remember, if you return again yourselves, your ears will be the next sacrifice you will be called on to make for your country.".
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