Hat

“ Every gentleman has his three-cornered hat, either on his head or under his arm; and all wear wigs in infinite variety,—the Tie, the Brigadier, the Spencer, the Albemarle, the Major, the Ramillies, the grave Full-bottom, or the giddy Feather-top. Look at the elaborate lace-ruffles, and the square-skirted coats of gorgeous hues, bedizened with silver and gold! Make way for the phantom-ladies, whose hoops require such breadth of passage, as they pace majestically along, in silken gowns, blue, green, or yellow, brilliantly embroidered, and with small satin hats surmounting their powdered hair. ”

“ Nature uses bright colors sparingly. If you look at a plant, you find it dark near the ground, growing lighter near the top with its green leaves, and then the blossom; the glory is at the top. Everything in nature teaches us to look up. So the hat should be the crowning glory of a costume, the center of interest, and should receive the most careful attention as to becomingness, suitability, and workmanship. ”

“ I've never seen any one quite so grand—top hat, latest style, long coat ditto, white buckskin waistcoat, twenty-thousand-dollar pearl in pale blue scarf, white spats, spotless varnish boots just from the varnishers, cream-colored gloves. You will make a hit! ”

“ You see the very men, with their scraggy necks sticking out of the collars of their old-fashioned square-skirted coats—their canes—their cocked-hats; and, when they meet, the formal bow, the hat off to the ground, and the powder flying in the wind. ”

“ Her hat was a silk one, set right on the back of her head, with a velvet rosettte and steel buckle in front, and a long veil of grey gauze streaming out behind. When we add orange gloves, and a riding-whip with a gaudy tassel appended to it, you have the details of a costume at once singular and unique. ”

“ From a dozen to twenty of these strands—dyed and undyed—are plaited into the flexible braid of which the hat is built up—a task requiring extraordinary patience and skill. Such hats are made only for relatives and close friends; if an unmarried girl gives one to a man the gift has the same significance as the pair of earrings he would give in return. When a native boy appears with a new and gorgeous hat, the origin of which is veiled in doubt, village gossip hums until the truth is known ”

“ A hat without a crown, a tattered coat, threadbare and out at elbows, a pair of breeches which looked like a piece of dirty patchwork diversified by various holes, and of boots which a Jew would hardly have raked from a kennel, at once proclaimed him a man who had seen better days. ”

“ THE MARQUIS. A well-proportioned Hat in every respect, and may, not inaptly, be termed the Universal, as it becomes most persons who wear it; in point of form, there is nothing of what may be called character or singularity in its appearance, and has the rare property of giving to the wearer a sort of dignified affability, a courteous condescension, together with an agreeable modesty, at least in appearance. ”

“ Styles may be simple, but colors must always be gay and rich as the colors from Nature's own palette. And the hat that is broad-brimmed and massed with bright flowers, is a fitting complement for such a costume. ”

“ The hat, like the ghost of the Amundevilles, will not be driven away. Here and there we meet with an individual gallantly leading a forlorn hope against the batteries of fashion, and we admire and pity. ”

“ In planning or choosing a hat we unconsciously decide upon those colors and outlines which are an outward expression of ourselves. A hat, as well as any article of clothing, may express many things—dejection, happiness, decision, indecision, gayety, dignity, graciousness, a trained or an untrained mind, forethought, refinement, generosity, cruelty, or recklessness. How often we hear some one say, “That hat looks just like Mrs. Blank!” Clothing of any kind is an index to the personality of the wearer. ”

“ A slight girlish figure, in a pale gray dress; a mantlet or scarf, edged with black lace, drawn closely round her; she was crowned by a pretty little hat, also bordered with black lace, and adorned with a large bouquet of primroses and tufts of narrow black velvet ribbon. Under the hat beamed a pair of thoughtful, earnest, dark-blue eyes—large and lustrous; eyes that none could pass unnoticed ”

“ A boy’s hat is a universal instrument. It is a bat to smack butterflies with, a bag to fetch berries in, a basket for stones to pelt frogs withal, a measure to bring up apples in. And a big-headed boy’s old felt hat was not stingy in its quantities ”

“ Nay, more—when science has made a further progress, why should not the expression of the hat afford knowledge of the passing mood of mind in its wearer, the hat shifting and changing in position as the brain beneath forms new combinations of thought? Let the shop-boy answer; does he not discover at a glance, from the style in which his master wears his hat at the moment, whether he, the subordinate, is to be greeted with scoldings and reproaches, or with commendations and applause? Does not the hat paternal forbode the sunshine or the storm ”

“ A well-dressed woman, in selecting her hat, must have given consideration to the relation of the size and shape of the head to the lines of the entire figure. Strictly speaking, a hat is a covering for the head, and it should seem to belong to the head, to protect it, and, through harmony of colour and proportion of line and mass, to improve the appearance of the whole costume. The artist, when drawing a figure, uses the head as the unit of measure. ”

“ Before making a hat, the entire wardrobe should be carefully looked over to see with what the hat must be worn, and the kind of service we are going to expect from it. Every article of a costume should be related and harmonious as to color, outline, and suitability. The result should be a perfect whole without a single discord. How often we see a green skirt, mustard-colored coat, and a bright blue hat—each article pleasing by itself, but atrocious when worn collectively. Bright, gay little hats are pleasing when seen seldom, but we soon tire of one if it must be worn daily. ”

“ It was the hat of a practical philosopher—of a thorough bred man of the world, who could extract sport from any thing, and who did not care, so that the occurrence afforded excitement, whether other people thought it reprehensible or not. Yes, yes—there is much in a hat—talk of your physiognomy and your phrenology—what are they as indications of character, feeling, and disposition, compared to the “set” of one’s beaver? Look at courage, will you, with its hat drawn resolutely down upon its determined brow. Dare you dispute the way with such a hat as that? ”

“ It is no less singular than true, that the same hat, by being placed on the head in different positions, will give, in appearance, as many distinct characters to the same person as the number of those positions amount to. ”

“ I believe that everybody’s experience will confirm this. A hat seen even in a shop-window starts the impulse to think of some wearer; but who would say that seeing a human head, say across the dinner-table or in an adjoining stall at the theatre, prompts us to think of its proper covering? Special circumstances, such as the presence of an exceptional baldness appealing to pity, must be added before our thoughts flit to the out-of-door receptacle. In other words, the whole interest and significance of a hat lie in a reference to a wearer, but not vice versâ. ”

“ A rounded crown can be made flat on top, and a slightly rolling brim can be made into a straight brim by using this method. It is a joy to take an old, discarded, battered straw hat and make it into a fresh-looking and up-to-date hat, a piece of work which any one may well be proud of. ”

“ You can tell by a glance at a man's hat to which set he belongs, for young England's first investment on landing is a puggaree, white or with coloured stripe, which he wears round his hat during the voyage, after which it is never seen again, being a plaything which is quickly replaced by the genuine article, a thick, white linen helmet for the military, or a huge hat of white pith for other mortals: a sort of great mushroom to which the human body acts as a stalk. ”

“ A three-cocked hat, and a plum-coloured coat, both rather the worse for wear, in which we have seen him frequently, invariably designated his person and habits; while a penurious economy, that bid defiance to all vulgar imitation, accompanied him to his grave. ”

“ The sense of the hat-band must be found in its once having been a real cord to draw in the mere round piece of felt which was the primitive hat; and to understand why our hat is covered with silk nap, it must be remembered that this is an imitation of the earlier beaver-fur hat, which would stand rain. ”

“ I would like a hat like that, and the same style of gown. It brings back the young ladies of former days, tall, well-formed, slender, beautiful. One would say that I am raving over a gown as I do over the man I love. ”

“ Fashionable riding dress in 1786. The costume consists of a broad brimmed hat with band and buckle, powdered wig and pigtail, a long-tailed coat with large buttons, tight buckskin breeches buttoned at the knee, and high boots. (Fig. 7) : A hat of the newest fashion of 1792, gaily decorated with gold strings and tassels. The natural hair is worn powdered, and the high coat collar is very characteristic of the time. ”

“ A bishop's hat shows the transition from the three-cocked hat to our present chimney-pot; and because sixty years ago beaver-fur was the fashionable material for hats, we must now needs wear a silken imitation, which could deceive no one into thinking it fur, and which is bad to resist the effects of weather. Even in a lady's bonnet the elements of brim, crown, and hat-band, may be traced.
The "busby" of our hussars affords a curious instance of survival. It would now appear to be merely a fancy head-dress, but on inspection it proves not to be so. ”

“ He would carefully brush the ugly hat of the great man and bring it to him,—he would pull out and smooth the large sticky fingers of his loose leather gloves and lay them side by side on a table ready for him to wear,—he would energetically polish the top of his big silver-knobbed stick,—and he would invariably make a ‘buttonhole’ of the prettiest flowers he could find for him to put in his coat at dinner. ”

“ The hat with this surface covering is wrapped very carefully in a piece of cloth or coarse hair-cloth, and operated on very lightly, and nearly in the same manner as when felting the body. The object to be attained [46] is to get the fibres of the fine fur to penetrate the body, and take root as it were therein—great care and watchfulness being demanded of the workman at every motion of his hands, in this manner of working. ”

“ The hat is the woman. In a thousand ways the hat declares the existence of occult meanings. A woman who would cut a man who wore a made tie, who would not buy a reproduced antique or pirated print, who knows Sèvres at a hundred yards and a real Bokhara in the dark, will cover her head with linen lilies and cotton-bloated roses. A woman who would hesitate to [133] put a jewel in her hair, will heap upon the dyed straw of her hat festoons of glass and steel and wax, with the fretted carcass of a bird. ”

“ THE TALLY-HO. A very comfortable and convenient hunting Hat, partaking in some degree the natural formation of the head: has many advantages over the old fashioned cap; is light, though strong-porous, which allows the heat of the head, arising from exertion, to fly off-and elastic, the effect of which is to sit close without pressure; but, above all, it has a most gentlemanly appearance, which it never fails to communicate to the wearer, particularly if he be a true sportsman. ”

“ The round ladies' hat, however, of the middle and end of the last century, may be seen in its primitive state in those enormous circles of straw, brought from Tuscany, and sold in our milliners' shops, fit to be pinched and cut into the prevailing fashion. The hats, both of men and women—when once they had quitted the becoming costume of the Middle Ages—arose out of one and the same type; a large circle of stuff with a projecting central cap for the skull. Human invention, in the matter of hats, seems for several centuries to have rested in this solitary idea. ”

“ THE SHALLOW. A Hat more admired for the ease and simplicity of style than for any peculiar character in its general appearance; being low in the crown, it is worn to most advantage by tall thin gentlemen with very large heads; and as the fore and hind part of the brim is set nearly horizontal from the base of the crown, it has two great advantages; the first of which is, that it may be conveniently worn over a wig ”

“ The chief shapes to mark in this century in male head-dress is the increased height of the tall hats which rise to vie with the female fashions. We still see a round hat [96] with a rolled edge and long fall over one side, besides shorter folds in the crown, both scalloped or foliated at the edge, and this shape may be noted till about 1460. Some of these hats were made without a crown, as in Fig. 28 (see p. 94) ; the roll was decorated, as a rule, with jewelled studs. A top hat, something like our present shape, appears, but more belled at the top and also a padded, rolled brim. ”

“ The hat is the most difficult article of the whole wardrobe to select. Most girls and women wear hats that are too small and that stand on the top of the head instead of fitting it. Good taste, Miss James says, in choosing hats means the very thing we have studied about: artistic appreciation, a knowledge of line and color and form as well as appropriateness. ”

“ In some hats the ribbon does not simply make the bow, but it is threaded through a greater or less number of holes in the leather, though now fulfilling no useful purpose. (See Figure 52.)
Fig. 52.—A hat with the remains of lacing.
[56]
In a hunting hat, however (see Figure 53) , the lacing is continuous round the hat, and the lining can be made to fit the wearer. It helps to form a buffer, should the huntsman unfortunately fall on his head, and it is claimed that many lives have been saved by this small detail. ”