The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1903-01-31
HATTERS.


Andrew Lang on Their Alleged Lunacy.
CAS- mad as halter" is a saying
current In the popular mouth, i'm
plying an extreme degree of mental de-
rangement. What can be the origin of
this proyerbial phrase? The relations
of the general public with hatters are
not intimate, but feeting and unfami-
liar. OF the hating psychology we
know little. OF our dentist we see
much, or at least we have long inter-
views with them. While our vocal
organs are under restraint, when we
are bitted and bridled with a great
flap of India rubber, or when a diaboli-
cal kind of drill. is playing in one of our
teeth, our dentist gives US extracts
from his autobiography, deprecates an
urban existence, praises the rus
amoenum, and recounts his adventures
as an angler for roach or club. Thus
we know good deal about our dentist,
and when he assures us that he is not
gong to hurt us we appreciate the
meaning Of the French proverb. When
the Gaul would imply that a person is
not accurate; he says that he lies like
dentist" of ''lies like a bulletin" This
phrase, of course, applies to the dentist
only In his professional practice, when
he Wanders from the precise truth with
the best and most humane of motives,
aiming less at deception than at "sug-
gestion.'. If you are ''suggestible" you
may, perhaps, by an extension of the
principle of faith healing, not be hurt
CT fol IIyifh
your most sensitives nerves.
OF the halter, as has been said, we
know much less than of the dentist, the
physician, the hairdresser, the solicitor
or even the shoemaker. The hairdress-
er appears to be interested in engaging
themes-politics, the turf the dramatic
art; on all he expresses himself with
freedom; his criticism is sound and
sane. We do not suspect his sanity
even when he recommends hair res
torers. The conversation Of the shoe
maker is practical confined to the mat
ter in hand-perhaps ought to say the
business on foot. Of bakers know lit
tie. TO butchers I always long to put
a question concerning their private the
DRY Of the origin of Lent, but a certain
bashfulness has hitherto prevented me
from entering a butchers shop merely
to PROFOUND this problem, and I await
an opportunity, hitherto denied to me
Except on one occasion,) of meeting a
butcher in private society. On that
occasion Qt was a Burns dinner) a
butcher suddenly and unexpectedly
arose and drew trenchant parallel
between the clerical and the
butcherly character and NOR
ais, charging heavily against
the clergy. felt that this was an in
telligent man, irritated probably by the
institution of Lent as prejudicial to his
profession and unduly favorable to that
of the fishmonger. A theory of the
origin of Lent he may have entertained;
but as he did not seem to be in very
good temper I hestitated to approach
him.
Nobody calls members of any of these
useful callings mad. We do not say as
mad as a solicitor, a publisher, a grocer
or plumber. We say las mad as
halter" I am unacquainted with any
history of Eminent British and For
eign Hatters,' which might throw
light on the subject. This work is a
desfderatum. I am acquainted with no
historical evidence tending to show that |
matters on any occasion exhibited
marked eecentricity in public or pri-
vate life. The inquiring intellect is
therefore thrown on mere hypothesis as
in the case Of Biblical criticism is al
most purely hypothetical, and appears
to be run" by hatters of the most
dishevelled description.
Though averse from baseless coniec-
ture, I shall throw purely provisional
hypothesis. AS to the origin of the pro-
verb which quite undeservedly) at
tributes deficient sanity to the manu-
facturers and vendors of headgear, the
truth, perhaps is that they have never
yet COPIED successfully with the central
problem of their existence. They have
never, to my knowledge, made a really
adequate hat-a head covering at once
comfortable in wind, rain and sun, and
also becoming. Of the hat of the pres
ent day it would be super7uously cruel
to speak in disparagement. It is ugly
beyond belief: it Is expensive; a moth
ing Injuries it; it is stained and ruff1ed
by a touch; it Is a mere dust trap; it
does not shade the face in sunshine; it
is ruined by rain las Mr. Swinburne
sings); 1T is of an odious uniformity;
and in all weathers 1t is exquisitely I'M
comfortable. No man, no halter was
maniac enough to invent this hat. It is
the result of more than three centuries
of evolution, always steadily degenera-
ting from worse to worse. About 1870 |
the Regent Morton wore a hat from |
which ours descends by lineal genera
ton. He was bad man, and it was a |
pREACHER NIIIlMTTrEn