Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1897-02-12
A FIDDLER WANTED.
HE WAS FAMED AND AT DANCE MUSIC
 DID VERY WELL.

Fun and Fcolie In a washout cn the Gre
 gon Short iao-Annionairos and Immi-
 grants Attend Dance and Experience
 D Musical Surprise.
 On St. Patriok's s day. 1894, five through trains, bound both to the cast ward and westward of the Oregon Short Line of the Union Pacific. were tied up at GIenns Ferry, Ida. They had been caught between two serious washouts. one at Poeatello and the other at Indian Greek, three days before, and had to wait at Glenns Ferry fer track repairs along the line before they could proceed. Gienns Ferry is bleak little railroad and sheep herders' town of 800 or 400 inhabitants, situate on a sagebrush bluH overlooking the unspeakably dark and dreary Snake river.
 The fivo stalled trains carried GOO passengers of as miscellaneous a oharao- ter as could be gotten together at carefully selected congress of types. There Wero emigrants and millionaires; 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 oiroling over the Snake river Shoshone Indians travel ing to the limits of their reservation; well behaved and quiet people, noisy and tnmultuous people. But all were stuck alike, and they made the best of it.
 Lines of social demareation were for the time erased. All hands mingled easily on the little station platform and ill the little station waiting room. The supply of food on the dining cars 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 at the tables in relays and patiently awaited their turns
 Tho railroad employees and their wives were to give a dance at the little town hall on St. Patrick night. The switchman who had been customarily employed to fiddle for them had been switched to another division. Inaduan- diary, tho dance committee toured the trains and station Go ascertain if any of the stalled passengers happened to be l carrying Q violin and was capable of producing music on it. h one of the sleeping cars they came across an artistic looking man, with very long hair seraphio, eleaginous eountenance and exceedingly baggy clothes They were looking for a fiddler. they said. Did he know of any on the train? We'll. he didn't know tin outrageously bad Bug llsh) he played little himself once in awhile, and had rather q fair fiddle with him. Tho long haired man accent cd tho 'sfiddleh rather euriously. But the erailroad men were overioyed. Would he play for them to dance with their wives and sweethearts? Certainlyl Did he know dance musio2 Well, some.
 All of the stalled passengers were in. yited to the dance, and they all went 4 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, ono of the members of which slipped $8 in ono dollar bills into the fddler's hand IS payment in advance for the evening wolsa r. YRS smiling iy accepted The dance began The ireman's s wife, who played the piano, produced an old bethumbed violin and piano tuno book and turned to the Ian eets. She told the fiddler, at the end of the first dance, that he did pretty well, only he went too fast. Then there was a waltz. The fiddler was informed by his aooompanist that he was getting along finely, and everybody in the room began to prick up his ears at the sweet ness of tho violin music, although the dances were common enough and tawdry enough.
 Another waltz-the Beautiful Blue Danube ' All of the dancers on the floor stopped dead at the first bar, and the travellers with cultivated musical ears moved close to the piano. The pi- enist ceased. She wished to listen. The violin music was miraculous. The play CT swayed from side to side as he phras- sd He appeared to be obliYious of his surroundings. Flo improylsed variations of inspiring tenderness. He out-Strauss. cd Strauss. His violin sang, throbbed with passion. When the last note died away, the people in the hall appeared to be in dream-all but one.
 .'M. Ysaye, said Charley Fair. the son of tho late United States Senator Fair, stepping from the throng, won't you play that lively, rattling thing you gavo us at the Bohemian club in San Francisco the other night? It's been running in my head ever since.
 M Ysave played Berlioz'a "Pi2zi cato" as he perhaps never played it r" fore. - Washington Star.