£30 For a Lock of Hair.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 29, Issue 38, 18 May 1917, Page 2

£3O For a Lock of Hair.

Keepsakes in time become relics, and relics become, if not sacred, often very precious—in terms of hard cash, that ie. It is not everybody that recalls the fact that Gambetta had a glass eye. The real one was removed whilst he was still unknown but a pupil of the great surgeon who performed the operation took possession of the real optic and put it in a bottle.

Presently the original owner of the eye took, the eye of the public, and became the “observed of all observers,” the idol of the French nation. Then the young man who possessed the eye of the idol traded Gambetta’s optic to an American millionaire for a great price. One would think that any relic of Cromwell would go like hot cakes, but a few years ago some of the Great Protector’s baby clothes, including a cap with the words, ‘Sweet Bab, don’t cry—ls 99,” embroidered upon it, only fetched £32. It is surprising how many locks of Napoleon’s hair are about. Surely his barber made a point of sweeping up when his imperial master had had a crop, a bit off the top, and doling out the chips to his customers at a franc a time !

There is a slump in these days in the price of Napoleon lovelocks. They used to fetch as much as £3O, about ss. a hair, but the last time a lock was put up to auction it only fetched 16/-

But evidently the sword is mightier than the hair, for at the selfsame sale the sword of the conqueror of Germany brought the noble sum of £OSO.

We read in Southey’s well-known poem about the ploughshare turning them out on the field of Betheim ! Just think of the millions of fragments of all kinds of war material which must be buried in the hundreds of miles of trenches along the two great fronts. They will be turned up for ages to come.