James Justinian Morier

“ The holy man repaid the ‎service by teaching me to read and write; and I made such progress under ‎his care, that in two years I could decipher the Koran, and began to write ‎a legible hand. When not in school I attended the shop, where I learnt the ‎rudiments of my profession, and when there was a press of customers, ‎was permitted to practise upon the heads of muleteers and camel-drivers, ‎who indeed sometimes paid dear for my first essays.‎
By the time I was sixteen it would be difficult to say whether I was ‎most accomplished as a barber or a scholar. ”

“ Hajji Baba's birth and education My father, Kerbelai Hassan, was one of the most celebrated barbers of ‎Ispahan. He was married, when only seventeen years of age, to the ‎daughter of a chandler, who lived in the neighbourhood of his shop; but ‎the connexion was not fortunate, for his wife brought him no offspring, ‎and he, in consequence, neglected her. His dexterity in the use of a razor ‎had gained for him, together with no little renown, such great custom, ‎particularly among the merchants, that after twenty years' industry, he ‎found he could afford to add a second wife to his harem ”

“ My mother's regret for the loss of my society, and her fears for my ‎safety, derived no alleviation from the prospect of my expected future ‎aggrandizement; she augured no good from a career begun in the service ‎of a Sûni ”