Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 August 1899 — SENATOR AND BARBER. [ARTICLE]

SENATOR AND BARBER.

Th* Honorable Mr. Fry* «f Maiae aa* .Hie French. When an honorable senator tells an amusing story at his own expense, it can be no disrespect to repeat it. Senator Frye, of Maine, one of the commissioners to negotiate peace between the United States and Spain, wears his heir cut in a fashion somewhat peculiar, and is particular to have it cut that way. He wrote home to a friend in Maine that during the peace negotiations in Paris his wife informed him that he must surely have his hair cut. Now he has a barber in Lewiston, Me., who knows how to cut his hair to his liking. “1 lie back in his chair,” says the senator, “while he talks fishing and fox-hunting and neighborhood news, and he shears it to my taste. I have my favorite barber in Washington, but in Paris I am not on speaking terms with any of the tonsorial profession.” However, the senator’s hair had to be cut. He went forth in quest of a barber, and found a shop. He entered; the barber came forward, and the senator turned on him, feeling more embarrassed than he had ever felt addressing the senate. He had gone through with a considerable rehearsal at home of the parts of “Conversational French in One Hour’’ which seemed to have any application to a barber shop, and this choice selection the senator now proceeded to address voluminously, and with his best accent, to the man of the shears. In this way he described exactly how he wanted it cut. The barber looked puzzled, and the senator began talking French again, and to tell the barber, very carefully this time, how he wanted to have his hair cut. “I illustrated it by signs,” he says, “that must have convinced him that I wanted my head cut off right above my coat collar.” Once more the man hesitated; but now, spreading his hands out inadeprecatory gesture, he said in very good English: “Ah, I beg your pardon; you are a Dutchman, I see, and speak no French. We. do not speak Dutch, but do you happen to speak English?” After that the senator and the barber got on perfectly well but he is still wondering what made the man think he was talking Dutch.—Youth’s Companion.