DRESSING THE HAIR OF THE DEAD.

Auckland Star, Volume XIX, Issue 100, 28 April 1888, Page 3 (Supplement)

DRESSING THE HAIR OF THE DEAD.

A Professional Talks About Her

Uncanny Occupation.

' I was only 12 years old,' said a prominent lady hair-dresser of this city, ' when I was cilled on by the friends of an old lady who had died to co and dress her hair.'

' And did you go ?' 'No; Iran and hid myself under a bed and stayed there a whole afternoon. Although I loved her and had often dressed her hair when she was alive, I could not bear the idea of doing it after death. But I have done many heads since for dead persons, and, while I do not like it, I have a professional pride in making them look well for the last time.'

' It must be very distasteful to you.' 'Not always. Ib come? in the way of my business, and naturally my employees shrink from going. Sometimes we have a call through the telephone to come to such a number and dress a lady's hair. One of the young ladies will be sent with curlingirons, pomades, hair-pins and other things, Only to find that the lady is a corpse. The girl will not nor cannot undertake it, and Igo myself. There is only the front hair to crimp and arrange becomingly. One day last week I dressed Mrs 's hair for the last time. She was young and very pretty, and looked as if asleep. The hair dops not die, so that it is easily arranged. When it is a wig or crimped I have it sent to the store, and when it is dressed, take it to the house and put it on. Let me tell you something that happened lately. A lady died in this city who wore a grey wig. I dressed it and put it on. You can just think how surprised I was when, a couple of weeks later, a member of the family came in here and tried to sell it to me. She said they had taken it off just before the casket was closed for the last time.'

'And did you buy it?1 ' Buy ib ? Certainly not. It is not very long since a man came in and offered me a number of switches of different shades and colour. I would not buy them, and sent for a policeman, as I thought? he had probably stolen them. But as it turned out, they came from an undertaker's and were the unclaimed property of strangers who had been given pauper burial.' 'Is it customary to dress the hair of the dead ?'

'It is. I have some customers who have exacted a solemn promise from me that I will dress their hair when they die and make it look natural and becoming. I have even been sent for by those who had only a few hours to live and taken my instructions from their dying lips.' 'Is the process the same as with the living?' ' Just bhe same, excepb that I do not arrange the back hair in all cases. Bub sometimes the hair is dressed entirely, just as ib would be for an evening party. _ And I frequently furnish new switches, crimps, or bangs, at the request of relatives who want no pains spared.' f And are you not afraid ?' Madame shrugged her handsome shoulders.

1 It is a lonesome task,' she said, ' and it certainly does make me nervous. Once the corpse opened her eyes and looked at me as a lady who was holding a lamp went out of the room in a moment, leaving me with a lock of hah* in the ciiinping-pins. A gust of wind blew the door after her, and I was in the dark alone with the dead women. I think if she had not opened the door just at the moment she did I'should have fallen insensible,'— • Detroit Free Press,'