“In that direction,” the cat said, waving his right paw, “lives
the hatter. And in that direction,” waving the other paw around,
“lives a March hare. Visit either you like--they’re both mad!”
The boy named Billy was reading aloud from Alice in Wonderland,
and when he had finished this sentence he looked up, keeping his
place with his finger shut in the book, and said, “I know what a
March hare would be; it would mean any old hare in the month of
March, very likely, but what’s a hatter? Is it a real animal, or
a madeup creature, like the Unicorn or the Dodo Bird, or is it
just a man who sells hats, as a grocer does groceries?”
“You’ve come very close to the real meaning of it,” said
Somebody, “for a hatter, as I see it, is one who makes hats.”
“Why, of course,” said the boy named Billy, “if I’d taken time
to think a little about it I’d have known. When did people begin
to wear hats, anyway, and what made them do it? They’re a great
bother--always blowing off when one is out-of-doors and having to
be hung up when one is indoors--they’re no good except to keep
one’s head warm and hair would do that if we gave it a chance.”
“Up to a certain point, Billy,” laughed Somebody, “if hair would
only stay on as well as hats do even, I’m sure everybody would
agree with you, but hair does not stay put in a good many cases,
and hats are far better and much less trouble than it would be to
wear wigs. No, I think the hat is a very useful invention.
“In fact, it is said that the earliest form of hat was a sort
of hood which was tied on over the head to keep the hair from
blowing ‘every which way,’ as it was common for both men and
women to wear the hair long and to allow it to hang loosely.”
“When did the kind of hats that we wear begin to be stylish?”
“About the time men began to cut their hair short, I suppose,”
said Somebody. “The chimney-pot hat, from which all the other
shapes grew, is only a little more than a hundred years old.”
“What are hats made of?” asked Billy. “I don’t mean ladies’ hats,
of course, they are made of everything, but the kind we men wear.”
Somebody smiled. “The kind you men wear are made of various
things. The very fine ones are made from Beaver fur and Coney
fur, and Molly Cotton Tail furnishes material for a great many
with her long hair which is chopped very fine, and some are made
entirely of wool. The braid for the straw hats comes almost
entirely from Italy, China and Japan, but is sewed and blocked in
this country.”
“Do we make many hats here?” asked Billy.
“Yes, indeed,” said Somebody, “making hats was one of our
earliest and most profitable industries. In 1675 laws were passed
prohibiting the sale of Raccoon fur outside the provinces,
because they were so valuable to the hatters, and it has grown
into one of our greatest industries.”
“Well,” said the boy named Billy, “I know now what a hatter is,
but I still do not know what he was mad _about_?”
“That was just a figure of speech,” said Somebody, “meaning that
he was not quite right in his head!”
“Oh!” said the boy named Billy, going on with the story.