Semi=weekly graphic., 1897-06-05
"A FIDDLER WANI ED.
RE WAS FAMED AND AT DANCE MUSIC
 DID VERY WELL.

Fun and Frolic In . washout on the Ore
 gon Short ine-Milllonaires and Immi-
 grants Attend a Dance md Experience
 Musical Surprise.
 On St. Patrick's day, 1894, five through trains, bound both to the east.
 ward and westward of the Oregon Short Line of the Union Pacific, were tied up
 at Glenns Ferry, Ida. They had been caught between two serious washouts,
 one at Pocatello and the other at Indian Greek, three days before, and had to wait at Glenns Ferry for track repairs along the line before they could proceed. Glenns Ferry is bleak little railroad
 and sheep herders, town of 300 or 400 inhabitants, situate on sagebrush bluff overlooking tho unspeakably dark and dreary Snake river
 The five stalled trains carried 600 passengers of as miscellaneous a charao. ter as could be gotten together at carefully selected congress of types There were emigrants and millionaires; soldiers on the movei dainty women in palace cars and women bound for Creede and Cripple Creek ill day coaches; min- CTS who killed time during the wait in shooting magpies cireling over tho Snake river; Shoshone Indians travel. ing to the limits of their reservation; well behaved and quiet people, noisy and tumultueus people. But all were stuck alike, and they made the best of it.
 Lines of social demarcation were for fhn | easily on the little station platform and III the little station waiting room. Th, supply of food on the dining cars gave out the first day of tho hitch, and every. body was fed, and well fed, too, in the station eating room. Ihey sat down at the tables in relays and patiently awaited their t1rns.
 The railroAd employees and their wives were to give q dance at tho little town hall on St Patricll's night. The switohman who had been customarilv employed to fiddle for them had been switched to another division In a quan dary, the dance committee toured the trains and station 10 ascertain If any of the stalled passengers happened to be carrying violin and was capable of producing music on it. In one of the sleeping ears they came across m artistic looking man, with very long hair, seraphic, oteaginous countenanee and exceedingly baggy clothes. They were looking for a fiddler, they said. Did he know of any on the train? Well. he didn't know Gin outrageously bad Eng lish) he played little himself once in awhile, and had rather fair fiddle with him. The long haired man accent ed the 't6ddle" rather curously. But the railroad men were overjoyed. Would he play for them 10 dance with their wives and aweethearts? Certainly Did he know dance music? Well. some
 All of the stalled passengers were in. vited to the dance, and they all went A good many of them could not get in. The baggily clothed fiddler turned up i'll good time. Tine pianist was waiting for him. So was the railroad dancs committee, ono Cf the members of which slipped a in one dollar bills into the Gddler's band as payment in advance for the evenings work 1t was smiling. ly accepted. The dance began. The fireman'n wife, who played the piano, produced an old bethumbed violin aiad piano tune book and tuned te the Ian. eers Ste told tho fiddler, at the end of Inc first dance, that lie did pretty well, l only he went too fast. Then there was a waltz. The fiddler was informed by his aecGmpalist that he was getting along finely, and every body ;lr the room began 10 pr.ck up his ears at the sweet. ness ce tho violin music, although tie dance5 were common enough md tawdr, enough.
 Another waltz-the Beautiful Blnr Danuhe. " All of tho dancers on the floor stopped dead at the first bar, and the travellers with cultivated musioal ears royed close to the piano. The pI. anist ceased. She wished to listen. The violin music was miraculous. The play. CT swnyed from side to side as he phras ed. He appeared to be obliyious of his surroundings. Ho improvised variations of ingpiring tenderness. He out-Strauss. cd Strauss. His violin sang, throbbed with passion. When the last note died away, the people in the hall sopeared to be ill dream-all but one.
 ' M. Ysaye, " said Charley Fair. th. son of the late United States Senator Fair, stepping from tho throng. wont you play that lively, rattIing thing you gave us et the Bohemian club in San Francisco the other night? It's been running in my head ever since. :"
 M. Ysave played Berlioz's "Piz2' cato' as he perhaps never played it F,