THE LATEST METHOD OF REARRANGING A FACE.

Shannon News, 25 July 1924, Page 4

THE LATEST METHOD OF REARRANGING A FACE.

By Stephen Lcacock. "I want my photograph taken," 1 said. The 1 photographer looked at me without enthusiasm. He was a drooping man in a grey suit, with the dim eye of a natural Scientist. But there is no need to describe him. Everybodv knows what a photographer looks like. "Sit there," he said, "and wait." I waited an hour. I read "The Ladies' Companion" for 1912, "The Girls' Magazine" for 1902, and "The Infants' Journal" for 1888. 1 began to see that I had done an unwarrantable thing in breaking in oh the privacy of this man's scientific pursuits with a face like mine. After an hour the photographer opened the inner door. "Come in," he said severely. I went into the studio. "Sit down," said the stenographer. I sat down in a beam of sunlighl fitered through a sheet of factory cotton hung- against a frosted skylight. The photographer rolled a machine into the middle of the room and crawled into it from behind. He was only in it a second —jus; time enough for one look at me —and then he was out again,' tearing at the cotton sheet and the window panes with a hooked stick, apparently fran- j tic for light and air. Then he crawled back into the ma-,' chine again and drew a little black cloth over himself. This time he was ,very quiet in there. I knew that he was praying and I kept still. When the photographer, came out at last he looked very grave and shook his head. !

"The face is quite wrong," he said. "I know," I answered quietly; "1 have always known it." He sighed. "I think," he said, "the face would be better three-quarters full." "I'm sure it would," I said enthusiastically, for I was glad to find that the man had such a human side to him. "So would yours. In fact," 1 continued, "how many faces one sees that are apparently hard, narrow, limited, but the minute you get them three-quarters full they get wide, large, almost boundless in—" But the photographer had ceased to listen. He came over and took my head in his hands and twisted it sideways. I thought he meant to kiss me, and I closed my eyes. But I was wrong. He twiste.l my face""as far as it would go aid vh* n stood looking at it. He sighed again "i don't like the head," he said. Then he tack to the machine ami took another look. "Open the mouth a little," he said. I started to do so. "Close it," he added quickly. Then- he looked again. "The ears are bad," he said; "droop them a little more. Thank you. Now the eyes. Roll them in under the lids. Put your hands on the knees, please, and turn the face just a little upward. Yes. that's better. Now just expand the lungs! So! And hump the neck—that's it —and just contract the waist —ha!—and twist the hip up towards the elbow—now! I still don't like the face, it's just a trifle too full, but —" I swung myself around on the stool. "Stop," I said with emotion, but, 1 think, with dignity. "This face is ratface. Tt is not yours; it is mine. I've lived with it for over forty years and I know its faults. I know it's out of drawing.. I know it wasn't made for me, but it's my face, the only one I have" —T was conscious of a break in my voice, but I went on —"such as it is, I've learned to love it. And this is my mouth, not yours. These ears are mine, and if your machine is too nar-row-—here I starl.nd to rise from the seat.. Snick!

The photographer had pulled the string. The.photograph taken. I could sec the machine still staggering from the shock. "I think," said the photographer, pursing his lips in a pleased smile, "that I caught the features just in a moment of animation." "So!" I said bitingly; "features, eh? You didn't think I could animate them I suppose? But let me see the picture." "Oh, there's nothing to see yet," he said. "I have to develop the negative first. Come back on Saturday, and I'll lot you set; a proof"of it." On Saturday I went back. The photographer beckoned me in, I thought he seemed quieter and graver than before. I think ,tioo, there was a certain pride in his manner. He unfolded the proof of a large

photograph and we both looked at it in silence. "Is it me?" I asked. "Yes," he said quietly, "it is you," and w e went on looking at it . "The eyes," I said hesitatingly, "don't look very much like mine." "Oh, no," he answered, "I've retouched them. They come out splendidly, don't they?" "Fine," I said, "but surely my eyebrows are not like that?" ' "No," said the photographer, with a momentary glance at my face,-"the ' eyebrows are removed. We have a i process now —"the Delphide—for putting in new ones. You'll notice here where we've applied it to carry the hair away from the brow. I don't like the hair low on the skull." •Oh, you don't, don't you?" I said. -No," he went on, "I don't care for it. I like to get the hair clear back to the superficies and make out* a new brow line." "What about the mouth?" I said with a bitterness that was lost on the photographer; "is that mine?" "It's adjusted a little," he said; "yours is too low, I found I couldn't use it." "The ears, though," I said, "strike me as a good likeness; they're just like mine." "Yes," said the photographer thoughtfully, "that's so, but I can fix that alright in print. We have a process now—the Sulphide—for removing the ears entirely. I'll see if—" '•Listen!" I interrupted, drawing myself up and animating my features to their full extent and speaking with a withering scorn that should have blasted the man on the spot. "Listen! I came hero for a photograph—a'picture —something which (mad though it seems) would have looked like me. I wanted something that would depict my face as heaven gave it to me, humble though the gift may have been I wanted something that my friends might keep after my death, to reconcile them to my loss. It seems that I was mistaken. What I wanted is no l.onger done. "Go on, then, with your brutal work. Take your negative, or whatever,it is you call it, dip it in sulphide, bromide, oxhide .cowhide —anything you like—remove the eyes, correct the mouth, adjust the face, restore the lips, reanimate the necktie and Teconstruct the waistcoat Coat it with an inch of gloss, shade it, emboss it, gild it, till even you acknowledge that it is finished. Then, when you have done all that, keep it for yourself and your, friends. They may value it,"