Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 101, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 April 1911 — Untitled [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

w LOVE your hair!” he said. JK , And Helene Cast smiled Bk content. ‘'Shake down your splendid hair,” the lover Lria|| 1 I said. “The sun will light LoSBl. ; I it glorious!" In lazy hapffSffillffiiiiHlia pi ness the Alpine village girl took, out four pins, threw Il>ae k her head, and gave a shake; down came the rippling. billowing cascade. Exultant, he who seemed but a dull Oauphlnols peasant, without poetry or esthetics, spread the massive ashblond tresses for tjie sun to strike fir© and gay gilt reflects from them. “I love your hair, Helene,” he said, and he said true. But in his heart he dreamed: “I might get eight hundred francs for It, if I could bluff that Airis buyer: ' One hair was bought only by the hair4acklng. The old, easy-going hair-buyer, half a peddler, went through Brittany, the Limousin and the Coneze with a stock of gay shawls, parasols and umbrellas, and by throwing a gold-piece here and there he could pick up the standard shades and qualities from poor girls who were ignorant or hopeless. At present false hair unashamed g*Jiy confessed, is rampant on heads beautifully endowed by nature. The vast hats of two years required great Quantities of puffing to frame the face beneath them. And now that rich woman of America and Europe seem confirmed in the craze of matching their own splendid tresses, to pile hair on hair, in great coiffures with large hats, small hats or no hats at all, the price of standard qualities has quadrupled; fancy hair attains extraordinary prices. Paris hairdressers rejoice in this new style buyer. Such a one had come to Saint Martin d’Urtage. He was scouring fill Savoy and Dauphlny, but to nine peasant girls In ten he remained the peddler out of whom good money might be luckily extorted for long and wavy heads of hair. In standard browns, blacks, pale blonds and red blonds. It was his rich dealings with the tenth girl that sent them fluttering. and all the more because the recent prize-winner had been Mere Qrtvonne. aged sixty-seven, but still lively In wind and limb. » After a week of dickering, the buyer had given her sixty dollars In bright ten-franc gold pleoes. and clipped—what no one on the mountain-side had noticed she possessed -a heavy head of silvery white hair of the rarest tint and quality. The buyer, boarding with Monbelun. the miller, was going over his stock and bis corresponds nee. The Paris wholesale house for which he traveled In connection with the most-expensive of the world’s hair dressers urged by mall and telegram for hair, more hair! Hair for twists and turbans! The era of frizettes and chichis has passed. No more does milady stick a dozen little puffs around her head. Do you remember how she used to sit oenstve? You thought she was dreaming of you. but she was only wondering If her frizettes were coming out. Her present alert confidence ,1s due to the knowledge that her Immense false twist is surely tight. Wound round and round, it makes the whole back of her present low coiffure. Hair for wigs! The ultrafashionables pull their own beautiful hair hack and wind It tight. On with the wig! Is It because they have not very lovely hair of their own? Undeceive yourself. They have enough, bat they want more. The new flat coiffures may look simple; but the great turbans demand long, thick hair. Moreover, the beauty of the effect depends on unmussed smoothness. hard to attain day by day. Our women have the habit of false hair. The present style Is suited to the wig. The wig is always smooth and smart. On with the wig! The automobile was the first pretext for wigs. Speed and dust will cut and djrty Madame’s precious locks, and the wind breaks down the undulations of the hot irons. Women who can not stand severely flat effects cling to their swelling Maroellc waves upon the sides. Now, you can run the hot Iron through false undnIstions without Injuring your precious hair; whence transformations. If the foundation of a wig is like e cup, that transformation is a mere band. See the fair one putting on her transformation! Fresh from the hot Iron, waving splendidly. It Is a crown es np-ewelilng tresses. Delicately she crowns herself with it. Upwards she smooths its rising wavelets, mixing them slightly with her own hair, underneath to where they meet at the crown, and then the big false braid conceals the meeting. Hair* lfore heir! The buyer going over stock and correspondence saw that he must kfcear what airla he could on market Jay. and 'jolt Saint Martin dTriage

for a more ignorant locality. His Paris house was selling long torsades of standard blond and brunette at $lB apiece, and the hair to make them was averaging sl2. Transformations of the same tints and quality were selling at between $25 and 50. Wigs were selling at between S4O and S6O per kilo. Yet here were girls with Jess than half a kilo on their heads refusing to be shorn for less than S3O. Do not be surprised at these figures. They are moderate — for “live” hair cut from vigorous European girls. The cheap article is brittle from strong chemical treatment—and dead Chinese women! Half the present false hair comes from China.

Some comes from an island In the Caribbean sea where the most malignant leprosy cases are sent by the Cuban authorities. A little while ago the head of the glove department of a New Yorw department store purchased a switch in the false hair department. Within two weeks from the time she began to wear the switch the upper part of her body was attacked with a disease which several doctors after consultation pronounced to be leprosy. Cheap false hair Is dangerous. It all comes from Indian and Chinese people. If you must have false hair, see to it that It is live hair. It will cost more, hut it’s safe. It is said that there are three qualities of hair in the market: fine soft hair, cut from the heads of live white girls, cheap hair that comes from dead women of other races, and still cheaper which is made Into 80-called “rats" and is said to derive its being mostly from different kinds of animals and to be “filthy, beastly stuff.” “I will put a notice in the "Place” that I am quitting Saint Martin d’Urlage after next market day,” he said to Monzelun, the miller. "The young men are standing in their own light not to order their own girls to come up and get their money!” “The young men are willing to sell,” replied the miller, “but they yearn for better prices. A poor girl’s hair Is her marriage portion; but at the rates you offer, it is as safe on her head. You can always walk down to Grenoble and sell It at need; and meanwhile more liberal buyers may happen along. Our young men know that hair is gone up."

“A little knowledge is a dangerous thing,” the buyer anskered. “Because I have have given heavy prices for a few rare heads, they must not think that common hair is scarce. In the next village I will find twenty marriageable girls who are willing to trade off their useless locks for the price of a young donkey.” He knew the miller would retail his talk on market day. The miller in these remote centers is the general exchange. Incoming peasants bring their bag of grist to him across the donkey’s back, take Eome a third in flour, and trade the rest. Not twice a year do they go to Grenoble, twenty miles down and back, up the innumerable steep la rets of the mountain side . They fear the city’s unknown vrays., The buyer knew this when he added: “As for the girls selling at Grenoble, why. we send hair to Grenoble ready made up!” But the buyer would not leave Saint Martin d’Urtage without a certain treasure. “Our clleht is a millionaire Americaine,” the great hair-dresser wrote. “We can offer you one hundred per cent on the lowest price you have to pay in case yo«< succeed r*und as the lady has honored us with practically unlimited ordqr. JLjfffH not conceal from you that I am giving this same commission to several buyers. Yon have carte blanche to match the gampV”

Tong the buyer had been waiting for a certain young man to come to him. Now the young man, having seen the miller, happened to stroll by. “Have you the cutting?” questioned the buyer. “No,” the young man answered. “I refuse to ask her for it till I know your price. I will not wound her feelings uselessly, I will not sell my girl’s hair for a trifle. Put on stamped paper that you will give $l6O and I will see about it. Don’t forget that my girl’s hair is naturally wavy.” “Absurd!” cried the buyer. “Here, I will tell you the whole truth. “All depends on the matching. If yqur girl’s hair does not match my sample absolutely, natural waviness will add —yes, say S2O, to fine ash-blond hair —say three-quarters of a kilo; why, S2O is a ridiculously high valuation, but I will write down on stamped paper that I will pay SIOO In case the sample matches.” Georges shook his head. "One hundred and ten dollars —I can not do better.” Negation. The young man did love her hair. "One hundred and twenty dollara in case the sample matches.” And love conquered—love of donkeys, heifers, goats, lambs, turkeys, chickens. “Write it down plain,” said the young man,, who also loved his girl’s tresses. Then, when he had the paper safely in his pocket, he added: “Now write what you will give in case the sample does not match.” Next market day at Saint Martin d’Uriage four girls stood with their splendid hair down around the stone bench opposite the mill. “Be seated.” The radiant buyer motioned to two of them.

He put their arms through the sleeves of a barber’s apron, over which, around his shoulders, he tied a black mußlin cape. Ostensibly it was to help him cut. In truth It was to help him judge the hair's consistency of tint before he actually sheared it. But It looked uncanny, like the preparation of an execution. The first girl went under comb and shears. Straight down the two Bides of her head —so that each half fell over a shoulder —the man combed all her tresses, parted at the crown. S-z-z-z-z —! The shears made a long, cpntinuous sound, no snipping—and in his left hand he held half the girl’s hair. ,8-z-z-x-z —! The girl was sheared. Next girl! The next girl was Helene Oast. You would not have dreamt that she wept all night. In lazy pride she took out four pins, threw her head back, gave a shake, and down came the rippling, wavy, billowing cascade. The sun struck fire and gave gold reflects from its ash-blond glory. “Hair is such a bother,” she laughed, bluffing bravely; “and the money is important. I hope Georges won’t mind much when he learns what I am doing.' He so loves my hair.”