Paderewski’s Hair

The Post Man had the pleasure of meeting Colonel Warburton Pollock yesterday in the rotunda of the New Hutchins.

Colonel Pollock is one of the most widely known men in this country, and has probably a more extended acquaintance with distinguished men of the times than any other living man. He is a wit, a raconteur of rare gifts, a born diplomat, and a man of worldwide travel and experience. Nothing pleases him so well as to relate his extremely interesting reminiscences of men and events to some congenial circle of listeners. His recollections of his associations with famous men and women would fill volumes.

Colonel Pollock has a suite of rooms permanently engaged in a Washington City hotel, where he passes, however, only a small portion of his time. He always spends his summers in Europe, principally in Naples and Florence, but he rarely stays in one place more than a few weeks or months.

Colonel Pollock is now on his way to South America to look after his interests in some valuable mahogany forests there.

The colonel chatted freely and most interestingly about his experiences, and told to an admiring and attentive group of listeners some excellent stories about well known people.

“Did I ever tell you?” he asked, as he puffed at his long black Principe, “about an adventure I had in Africa a few years ago? No? Well, I see Paderewski is coming to Houston soon, and the story may not be inapropos. You have all heard Paderewski’s wonderful hair spoken of, of course. Well, very few people know how he came by it. This is how it was. A few years ago, some of us made up a party to go lion hunting in Africa. There was Nat Goodwin, Paderewski, John L. Sullivan, Joe Pulitzer, and myself. That was before any of us had acquired fame, but we were all ambitious, and every one of us needed the rest and recreation we were taking. We were a congenial, jolly crowd, and had a rattling good time on the trip. When we landed we hired guides, and stocked up with provisions and ammunition for a month’s trip into the Zambesi country.

“We were all anxious to kill a lion, and we penetrated into quite a wild and unexplored region.

“We had great times at night over our camp fire, chatting and chaffing one another, and thoroughly enjoying ourselves.

“Paderewski was the only member of our party who had been making money. It was just about the time there was such a furor about his playing, and he had plied up quite a neat sum from his piano recitals.

“One day Goodwin, Sullivan, Paderewski and I were loafing around camp just before dinner. We had been out hunting all the morning without success. Pulitzer had not yet shown up. Goodwin and Sullivan got into a dispute about the proper way to dodge and counter a certain upper cut made famous by Heenan. You know Nat Goodwin is quite an athlete himself, and handles his hands like a professional. Paderewski was always a quiet sort of fellow, but amiable and well liked by everyone. He was sitting on the stump of a banyan tree gazing into the distance with a dreamy look in his magnetic eyes. I was loading some cartridges, and not paying much attention until I heard Sullivan and Goodwin raise their voices in quite an angry dispute.

“ ‘If I had a pair of gloves, I’d soon prove I am right,’ said Nat.

“ ‘I wish you had,’ said John. ‘In a minute you wouldn’t know anything.’

“ ‘You couldn’t stand up two minutes before a man who knew the first principles of boxing,’ said Goodwin. ‘Your weight and your rush are the only points in your favor.’

“ ‘If we just had some gloves!’ said John, grinding his teeth.

“They both turned and looked at Paderewski as if by common consent.

“Paderewski at that time had coal black hair, as smooth and straight as an Indian’s, that hung down his back in a thick mass.

“Sullivan and Goodwin sprang upon him at the same time. I don’t know which of them did it, but there was the flash of a knife, and in two seconds Paderewski was scalped as neatly as a Comanche Indian could have done it.

“They divided the mass of hair in two parts, each stuffed his portion into two leather cartridge pouches, wound the straps around his wrists, and they went at each other in regular prize ring style with their extemporized boxing gloves.

“Paderewski gave a yell of pain and dismay, and clasped his hands to his bald head in horror.

“ ‘I am ruined,’ he said. ‘My professional career is at an end. What shall I do?’

“I tried to separate John and Nat, but I got a backhander from one of those Paderewski boxing gloves that stretched me out into a big cactus.

“Just then Joe Pulitzer came into camp, dragging a big lion by the tail he had just shot in a canebrake on the river.

“ ‘Vat’s dis?’ he asked, gazing through his spectacles at the two boxers who were hitting at each other and dodging around and at Paderewski, who was wailing and moaning at the loss of his scalp.

“ ‘I wouldn’t have taken $5,000 for that hair,’ he groaned.

“ ‘Vat vill you gif,’ said Pulitzer, ‘for another head of hair yoost as good?’

“He went up close to Paderewski and they whispered together for a few minutes. Then Joe got out a tape line and measured Paderewski’s head. Then he took a knife and cut out a piece the exact size from the back of the lion’s head and fitted it on Paderewski’s. He pressed it down close, and bound it with light bandages.

“It seems almost incredible, but in three days the skin had grown fast, the pain was gone, and Paderewski had the loveliest head of thick, tawny, flowing hair you ever laid your eyes on.

“I saw Paderewski give Pulitzer a check that evening behind the tent, and you can bet it was a stiff one. I don’t know the exact figure, but Joe bought out the World as soon as we got back to New York and has since done well.

“It simply made Paderewski’s fortune. That head of hair he wears will make him a millionaire yet. I never hear him bang down hard on the bass keys of a piano, but I think of a lion roaring in a South African forest, and I’ll bet he does, too.”

“I like stage people,” continued Colonel Pollock. “They are, as a rule, the jolliest companions in the world and the most entertaining. Hardly a year passes that I do not make up a congenial party for a pleasure trip of some kind, and I always have two or three actors in the crowd. Now, a year or two ago, some of us got together and took a three months’ voyage to see the sights. There were DeWolf Hopper, Dr. Parkhurst, Buffalo Bill, Eugene Field, Steve Brodie, Senator Sherman, General Coxey, and Hermann, the great magician, among the party.

“We were guests of the Prince of Wales, and went in his steam yacht, the Albion. None of us had been to Australia, and the prince wanted to show us around that country. We had a lovely trip. We were all congenial souls, and our time on shipboard was one long banquet and frolic during the whole journey.

“We landed at Melbourne and were met by the governor of Victoria and only a few dignitaries of the place, as the prince had sent word that he wished to pass his visit there strictly incog. In a day or two our entertainers took us on a little tour through New South Wales to show us the country, and give us some idea of the great mining and sheep raising industries of the country. We went through Wagga Wagga, Jumbo Junction, and Narraudera, and from there went on horseback through the great pasture country near Cudduldury.

“When we reached a little town named Cobar in the center of the sheep raising district, some loyal Englishmen living there recognized the prince, and in an hour the whole town was at our heels, following us about, huzzaring and singing ‘God save the Queen.’

“ ‘It’s annoying, Pollock,’ says the prince to me, ‘but it can’t be helped now.’

“Our party rode out into the country to have a look at the sheep ranches, and at least two hundred citizens followed us on foot, staring at us in the deepest admiration and wonder.

“It seemed that it had been a mighty bad year on the sheep men, and they were feeling gloomy and disheartened over the prospects. The great trouble in Australia is this: The whole continent is overrun with a prolific breed of rabbits that feed upon the grass and shrubs, sometimes completely destroying all vegetation within large areas. The government has a standing offer of something like 50,000 pounds for a plan by which these rabbits can be destroyed, but nothing has ever been discovered that will do the work.

“During years when these rabbits are unusually destructive, the sheep men suffer great losses by not having sufficient range for their sheep. At the time of our visit the rabbits had almost ruined the country. A few herds of sheep were trying to subsist by nibbling the higher branches that the rabbits could not reach, but many of the flocks had to be driven far into the interior. The people were feeling very sore and blue, and it made them angry to even hear anybody mention a rabbit.

“About noon we stopped for lunch near the outskirts of a little village, and the prince’s servants spread a fine cold dinner of potted game, pâté de foie gras, and cold fowls. The prince had ordered a large lot of wines to be sent along, and we had a merry repast.

“The villagers and sheep raisers loafed around by the hundred, watching us; and a hungry-looking, starved-out lot they were.

“Now, there isn’t a more vivacious, genial and convivial man in the world than Hermann, the great prestidigitateur. He was the life of the party, and as soon as the prince’s wine began to mellow him up, he began to show off his tricks. He threw things in the air that disappeared from sight, changed water into liquids of all colors, cooked an omelet in a hat; and pretty soon we were surrounded by a gaping, awestruck lot of bushmen, both natives and English born.

“Hermann was pleased with the open-mouthed attention he was creating, so he walked out into an open space where he could face them all, and began drawing rabbits out of his sleeves, his coat collar, his pockets by the half dozen. He threw them down, and as fast as they could scamper away the great magician kept on pulling out more rabbits to the view of the astonished natives.

“Suddenly, with a loud yell, the sheep raisers seized clubs and stones and drawing their long sheath knives, rushed upon our party.

“The prince seized my arm.

“ ‘Run for it, Pollock,’ he cried, ‘this rabbit business has set them wild. They’ll kill us all if we don’t cut our sticks.’ ”

“I believe,” said Colonel Pollock, “that that was the closest shave I ever had. I struck out as hard as I could run, with about forty natives after me, some of them throwing spears and boomerangs at me every jump. When I was going over a little hill I turned my head and looked back just in time to see Steve Brodie jump off a bridge into the Murrumbidgee river at least 200 feet high. All our party escaped, and came straggling back within two or three days, but they had some tough experiences. Senator Sherman was out two nights in the bush and was severely frostbitten.

“I understand DeWolf Hopper is going to dramatize the incident, and will produce it next season, appearing as a kangaroo.

“Coxey was caught on the edge of a little stream which he refused to enter, and the natives dragged him before an English justice of the peace who released him the next day. The prince took the whole thing as a good joke. He is an all round good fellow and no mistake.

“Sometime,” said Colonel Pollock, as he rose to receipt for a telegram, “I will tell you about an adventure I had among the Catacombs of Rome, along with Ralph Waldo Emerson, Barney Gibbs and the Shah of Persia.” Colonel Pollock leaves on the night train for San Antonio on his way to the City of Mexico.