The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1882-09-07
HATS.
Some Reflections Of an Englishman Who Has
Travelled With Open Eyes.

There are more sides to hat than most
people think. For besides the inside and
the outside, the right side and the wrong
| side, there are political, social, religious,
| chronological, serious, humorous-and ever
so many other-sides as well. indeed, it
would be well that if in these days of pro-
| found research some one would go deeply
| into the hat-put all his head. so to speak,
into it. He might find more in it than he
expected.
| For myself, during my recent travels in
| America have been at times fairly over
| whelmed by the contemplation of some of
| the head coverings have seen, and more
| especially among the supplementary
classes, if I may call them SO, of the Amer
| lean people. Following the course of en-
| pire westward, found that after leaving
the mulatto states / passed through the red
Indian to the Chinese on the Pacific, and
| then, going south, traversed the Mexican
until came to the negro, and through him
got back again to the mulatto. As mat
| ter of chronological geography this division
of the states was sufficiently interesting,
but an additional interest accrued from
looking at it from the hat standpoint. As
general rule it may be accepted that hats
are made only for white men, and that the
supplementary classes wear them after they
gro, as general thing, only arrives at
hat after it has been thrown away several
times. Nobody but a negro cherishes a
very old hat.
The Chinaman, itmay be, buys second
hand hat and after ironing the brim out
flat wears it with decency. A red Indian
begs or steals one and, after cutting out a
hole in the crown, stuffs the orifice with
feathers and walks round the camp with
much complacency. The mulatto, having
found one lying about, washes it, ties a
blue ribbon round it and wears it on Sun
day. But the negro meets with the old hat
and straightway puts it on to as much of
his head as it will cover. He does not try
to improve it or to ornament it. When he
first saw it lying in the road it was IAN ole
hat" but once his it becomes a new posses
sion, and never grows any older until he
finds another. And in America, scattered
up and down the states, there is prodigi
Gus number of them lying about, especially
in the west, and most especially in the
mining districts. 1t seems to be point of
honor among miners not to wear second
hand hats for if they choose they certainly
need never buy one. Perhaps they sus-
pect old hats to be only some strategem of
the enemy to get them into a quarrel over
a claim, either to it or to something else.
At any rate, whatever the reason, they
never touch them any more than coyote
will touch dead Mexican. (The Mexican,
by the way, eats so much red pepper when
alive that the coyote will not eat him when
dead. So they say.) The 'tcolored man,
however, does not frequent mines,
or he might revel in a new old
hat every day. He prefers civilizs-
ton, and the resnlt in the |
matter of his head covering, is very strik- |
ing. His appreciation of the independence |
of American citizenship leads him into the |
most complete recklessness. There is |
nothing that he will not put on the top of |
his head-provided there is only enough of |
it to assure him that it once formed part |
of cap or a hat, and that he can balance |
the fragment on his head. In Texas and |
Arkansas his originality excels itself-he |
turns anything into hat. | saw a negro |
sitting on a woodpile, near Marshall, with |
the lid of luncheon basket on his head |
and tied round his chin with red ribbon.
He was a simple person, for he accepted |
the remarks of my companions in the kind |
Hest spirit possible and told us that he had
another hat at home. This was only his
working day hat. The Indian has very
marked tastes, for he prefers the ''stove-
pipe" hat, if without crown so much the
better. Next to this is the gray felt, the
light color having superior facilities of
adornment. He begs for fragments of
ribbon or for the metal ornaments used as
trade marks on cakes of chewing tobacco
and trims the crown with them, while he
adorns the brim with friDges of his own
continuance. The labels off sauce bottles
make a ehaste ornament for hats of this
kind. The Chinaman is pronounced
He understands, moreover,
the real object of a hat in hot
and does not hesitate there
fore at any width of brim. When work
ing in the sun, as | saw them in gangs on
the Southern Pacific line, he wears con-
struction that looks something like lauu
dry basket Speaking roughly, hats in
crease in brim as security to life and prop
erty diminish. 1t was man without a
hat that stabbed Buckingham This is
true all the world over whether we are
among the wide -turbaned Kookas in India,
the flap HATED banditi of Italy or the
cow boys of Arizona and Texas. The UNI
brageous 5rim of the hat of the Arizona
ow-boy-tfthe white Indian as he is
called, and he is indeed often more terrible
to meet than the reds the flag, as it
were. of his INSTRUMENTATION to laws He
Is no respeeter of limits, and ex presses a
general abhorrence of discipline by the Ii
cense which he takes in hats, A narrow
brims sayors to him of cramping civiliza-
ton. He refuses to be cribbed up under
ordinary head-gear. Nothing is too wide !.