It happened however that my friend had always owned one of the most remarkable faces in the world, which the vulgar is used to call frightful, distorted and ugly; he had besides the habit of making grimaces, and ogled me with such cordiality, that at every sitting I could not help answering him, and, being so close to him, involuntarily imitated his other oddities. If he hauled up my nose to an inordinate height, he in return, in order to reach the corners of my mouth with the instrument of his art, pulled my lips and mouth violently across. When in this mechanical manner he had forced a seeming smile upon my countenance, his laugh met me, so amiable, friendly, cordial and affecting, that often out of painful sympathy, and merely to stifle a wicked laugh, the tears came into my eyes. 'Man! Barber friend!' I exclaimed: 'withhold that benignant contraction of thy muscles; I am not smiling, thou dost but pull the corners of my mouth apart like a spunge.' 'It boots not,' answered the honest soul, 'thy winning graces in that smile force me to return them." Well, so we grinned at one another like apes for minutes together. "I observed at the end of twelve weeks a striking alteration in my physiognomy. The nose mounted and towered aloft prodigiously, as if it would proclaim war upon my eyes and forehead, not to take into account the really ugly contortions of the cheeks and lips, which however I could not drop, because I had received them as a memento from my friend. I pressed the aspiring nose down again, and once more represented my wishes to my generous friend. Now however good counsel seemed scarce, and an expedient hardly possible. Still he resolved, a second Raphael, to adopt a third unexceptionable manner, and after a few struggles he succeeded, having beforehand cautiously ascertained towards which side the operation might be most advantageously directed, in twisting my nose as he rested upon it; and at this point we remained stationary, and thus inevitable fate has bent it for me; my true face, towards which my developement instinctively tended, has furrowed me with these folds, and deep research and speculation, flaming enthusiasm and glowing love for goodness and excellence, have finally woven this red tissue over the whole."