The Evansville journal. (Evansville, Ind.) 1834-184?, 1844-12-12
arLLBET YOU A HATn

If any one can read the following season
lble article from the last number of ssNeal's
Saturday Gazette" without a hearty side
shaking, we can only say that he is less east
" moved than we thought he was:
"BETTrNG HATs.-In recent number We
had occasion to speak of the multitudinous
uses to which the hat is converted in this en-
terprislng, utilitarian, and extensive country,
where even a mans beaver can claim no ex-
emption from toll but is condemned to do all
sorts of over-work, rendering the article a
means of transporting goods as well as a
place of storage for su CHI odds and ends as
are likely TO come in play during the days
progress. Ask a child for any thing and he
forthwith takes off his hat 10 find it and the
child, as Wordsworth has it, is, in this res
pect as in others, farther to the man, But,
in addition TO these services on the part of
the hat-Geslei was not so unreasonable,
then, in requiring homage to be paid TO SO
useful a member of society-besides being
employed as a receptacle for cigars, news
papers, collars, apples, ground nuts, unpaid
bills, and so forth-besides being a means of
salutation and a method of giving emphasis
to a hurrah-the hat has one purpose more,
which was omitted strangely enough, too, at
the present moment, when the fact is so con-
%tinually in evidence, and we, therefore, has.
ten to correct the error. The hat may be
regarded as a test of sincerity in assertion,
and as the clincher TO an argument. If a
man will not be convinced by words that he
is wrong-ifh he is obstinate and will not de-
fer to your opinion-what's the use of dis
putting any longer? Bet him a hat. Pooh!
nonsense-why, how you talk-Il bet you
a hat,' which being done the heat of contro-
versyis at once abated. The hat comes
down apon the fame of discord like an ex-
tinguisher to the rushlight. II he IS unwil-
ling to bet a hat it is the immediate inference
that he breads losing a hat, and has TO faith
in his W positions. If he does oct a hat,
there is, for the present, nothing more to be
said. The hat is a peace-maker. "When q
crowd gathers alta corner in high parry times,
and controversy wakes fierce, do not be a.
harmed; there will be no violence, except IN
, words. Instead of an ASA ult and battery ii
? results in a general betting Of hats. There
is no necessity for calling on the police
Bet him a hat. Hercules, in big whiskers
and with pondereus fists, rushes savagely al
his opponent. Will murder be committed
Not al all--homicide is out OF fashion. Her
%cules bets him a hat. fHa, hap says Her.
culesl've settled that fellow hes afraid TO
bet a dollar hat.n
I "The hat, then, is a new principle in the
u contentious of men, acting as a sedative, and
as of late years the violence which formerly
: marked elections has to a very considerable
, extent disappeared, the fact is possibly to be
: attributed to the growing fondness for bett
ing hats. Perhaps, as a matter of importan
} statistics, it would be as well to provide that
: i'll taking the census, dilligent inquiry shoulC
! be made into the number of hats which are
; thus brought into the field at every Presiden
= tial contest. 1t must certainly give a grea
: impulse every four years to the manufacture
: of the article; and the hatters themselve
= have solid reason to rejoice that ell bet yo
= a hat" has become a national phrase and
popular practice: while the philosopher:
= from Plato down to Adam Smith, who hav
lo so long been puzzled 10 give a succint def
; milton Of man, and have wandered in the
p description from "a tw%o-legged animal will
out feath ers' 10 "a creature who makes bai
gains have the work done to their handsi
a setting down human nature as "a being tn;
'' bets hats.n