Page 314.--Old residents at Surat may remember an ancient local
celebrity named Tom the Barber, among whose recollections of former
days was a chronicle of a renowned duelist, who used to amuse himself
by shooting with his pistol, somewhat after the fashion of the
Pearl-shooter. The little tin can of hot water which Tom carried,
slung from his forefinger as he went his morning rounds, was a
favorite mark. So were the water-jars on the heads of the women as
they passed the duelist's house coming from the well; and great was
Tom's relief when an old woman, who could not be pacified by the usual
douceur for the loss of her jar and the shock of finding the water
stream down her back, appealed to the authorities and had the duelist
bound over to abstain in future from his dangerous amusement.
So vivid were Tom's recollections of his own terrors that, after the
lapse of half a century, he could ill conceal his sense of the
poetical justice finally inflicted on his tormentor, who was killed in
a duel to which he provoked a young officer who had never before fired
a pistol.
[Decoration]