Hat Feathers.

Cromwell Argus, Volume 1, Issue 51, 2 November 1870, Page 6

Hat Feathers.

Tlie following humorous allusion to the absurd fashion of men wearing feathers in their hats is from a Melbourne contemporary : It would seem that, in Melbourne at least, we have not even yet reached the climax of absurdity in men's head-dresses. Our young men —nay, some ef our old men—have got as far as feathers, which are frequently displayed with effect upon heads with an undoubtedly appropriate adornment. Like hats, like heads. But already, in Europe, certain exquisites have got a great deal beyond feathers. Thev have got as far as parrots’ wings and humming birds’ heads, with blackbirds or ravens for mourning, and swallows or magpies for half-mourning ! On the principle that the apparel oft proclaims the man, what sort of young men must be these Maurices? Bold young man who will bo the first to appear ‘‘on the block” as a parrot or a magpie. But even this is not all. One enterprising hatter, we are told, lias contrived to tit these adornments with an apparatus for imitating the cry of the bird selected as an appendage. A slight movement of the forehead is sufficient to set the little machine in movement. It is, therefore, unnecessary to take off the hat on meeting a friend ; you frown, or elevate the brow, the bird screams, and this constitutes a greeting. Delightful ! Talk of the girl of the period after that ! What would a sober man of business do if be received from the junior clerk in his count-ing-house, in place of the f >rmal bow, the scream of a cockatoo, or the croak of a raven ? Of course there need be no limits to choice : there is room for most ingenious fancy. Why should not a man be at liberty to have a variety of hats, with a variety of symbolical birds or beasts thereon, which he might wear from day to day, according to humour or temperament ? A quarrelsome man might adopt the crest of a bulldog, and a detective might fancy a weasel. Clergymen might go as rooks, hobbledehoys might be confined to cock-sparrows, soldiers to butcherbirds, members of parliament to parrots, decidedly, or, in a few instances, to gorillas ; and members of the society for the promotion of morality to storks or bittsrns. The professors of music might affect humming birds, and newspaper men might select owls. If every man would be honest, the masquerade would be better than the fancy ball, while the amusement of the ladies would be inexhaustible.