Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1897-03-12
A FIDDLER WANTED.
HE WAS FAMED AND AT BANcE MUSIC
 DID VERY WELL.

DID VERY WELL.
 Fun and Trolie In A wnshout on the ora- gon Short Line -Millionaires and Iinlsi- grants Attend 8 Dance and Experience Musical Surprise.
 On St. Patriek's day, 1894, five through trains, bound both to tho cast ward and westward of the Oregon Short Line of tho Union Pacific, were tied up at Glenns Ferry, Ida. They had been caught between two serious washouts, one at Poeatello and tho other at Indian Greek, three days before, and had to wait at Glenns Ferry for track repairs along the line before they could proceed. GlennH Ferry is bleak little railroad and sheep hordors' town of 300 or 400 inhabitants, situate ea a sagebrush bluff overlooking tho unspoakably dark and dreary Snake river.
 The hye stalled trains carried 600 passengers of aa miscellaneous q charac. ter as could be gotten together at carefully selected congress of types There were emigrants and milIionaires, soldiers on the move; dainty women in palace cars and women bound for Creede and Cripple Creek in day coaches; min CTS who killed time during tho wait in shooting magpies oircling over the Snake river; Shoshene Indians travel ing to the limits of their reservation; well behaved and quiet people, noisy and tumultuous people. But all wore stuck alike, and thoy made the best of 1t.
 Lines of social demarcation were for tho time erased. All hands mingled easily on the little station platform and in the little station waiting room. The supply of food on the dining ears gave out the first day of the hitch, and every. body was fed, and well fed, too, in the station eating room. They sat down ct the tables in relays and patiently awaited their turns.
 Tho railroad employees and their wives were to give dance at the little town hall on St Patrick S night. The switehman who had been customarily employed to fiddle for them had been switched to another division h auan diary, tho dance committee toured the trains and station Go ascertain if any of the stalled passengers happened to De carrying Q violin and was capable of producing music on it. In one of the sleeping cars they came across an artistic looking man, with very long hair q seraphie, oleaginous eountenanoe and exceedingly baggy clothes. They were looking for Q fiddler, they said. Did he know of any on tho train? We'll nc didn't know Gin oHtrageously bad Eng ligh1 he played little himself once in awhile, and had rather fair fiddle with him. Tho long haired man aeeent- cd tho 'fiddles rather euriously. But tho erailroad mon were oyerioyed. Would he play for them to dance with their wives and aweethearts? Certainiyi Did he know dance music? We'll, some.
 All of the stalled passengers were iD- yited to tho dance, and they all went A good many of them could not get in The baggily clothed fiddler turned up ill good time. The pianist was waiting for him. So was the railroad dance committee, one of the member 0f which slipped $3 in ono dollar bills into the fiddler's hand as payment in advance for tha evenings g work It WAS smiling ly accepted. The dance began. The fireman'a wife, who played the piano. produced aa old bethumbed violin and piano tune book and turned to the.lan- cers. Sh6 told tho fiddler, at the end of tho first dance, that he did pretty well, only he went too fast. Then there was a waltF. Tho fiddler was informed by his accompanies that he was getting along finely, and everybody in the room began to prick up his ears at the sweet- ness c9 the violin music, although the dances were common enough and tawdry enough.
 Another waltz--the Beautiful Blue Danuhe. All of the dancers on the floor stopped dead at the first bar, and the travellers with cultivated musical cars moved oloso to the piano The pi. nnist oeaaed. Ghe wished to listen. The violin music was miraculous The play CT swRyed from side to side as he phras- ed He appeared to be obliv1ous of his surroundings He improylsed vari ations of inspiring tenderness. He Strauss cd Sbrauss His violin sang, throbbed with passion. Whom the last note died away, tho people in tho hall syapeared to be in dream--all but one
 ''AI. Ysaye," eaid Charley Fair. the son of tho late United States Senator Fair, stepping from the throng. "won { you play that lively, rattling thing yon gave us at the Bohemian club in San Francisco the other night? It's been running in my head ever since
 NJ Ysaye played Berlioz's fPizai oato'' as he perhaps never played it F. fore. Washington Star
 
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