“A queer case of hair raising occurred near Otway, this county, on Friday of last week. The Carters and Wilsons live about a mile north of Otway. Some time ago Mrs. Wilson loaned Mrs. Carter a barrel; when the barrel was returned Mrs. Wilson remarked with some emphasis that it was not the barrel she had loaned her but a far inferior article in the barrel line. Mrs. Carter sassed back, and after a little facial and verbal skirmish the two women got into each other’s hair. About the first jerk that the Wilson woman made on the raven locks of her antagonist the whole business came off. It didn’t come out by the roots, but just parted close down to the head as if cut off by a knife. There is an impression in Otway that the Carter woman had expected the encounter and had prepared herself for the occasion by cutting her hair close to the head and placing it back on the head like a switch. When Wilson, the husband of the one woman, stepped in to stop the fight, Carter came rushing out with a knife and cut him severely on the right arm. Carter has since skipped the country. Wilson is said to be a harmless and peaceable man, and as he was entirely paralyzed on one side already, his wound makes him almost entirely helpless.’1
