Supplementary Remarks.—Having completed the description of each process as ordinarily con ducted, it will be well to supplement it by a few very important hints, which may lead to beneficial and profitable results. For instance, the fulling-stock may be made the vehicle for dyeing or staining all fancy colours, as drabs, beavers, slates, mouse, tan, rosy drabs, and many others. Some makers partially dye, and then complete the staining in these. stocks. A useful beaver stain is made of 11- lb. copperas and 1 pint iron liquor (pyrolignite of iron) diluted with boiling water, 4 oz. Hofmann's aniline blue, and 4 oz. indigo extract (free from vitriol, or this will turn it green), for 1 doz. hats. Another good beaver brown for the fulling-stocks, for 24 doz. 3-oz. bodies, is 1 lb. common graphite (blacklead), 3 lb. Venetian red, 1 gill indigo extract. A cream-colour for 24 doz. 3-oz. bodies, is 2 lb. red-lead, 2 lb. common terra castle, 2 gills indigo extract in liquor, 3 gills orchil. A fawn-colour for the same hats is 11 lb. burnt sienna, ground fine, 1 lb. burnt umber, 1 gill orchil, gill indigo extract in liquor. Mouse-colour : 3 ]b. common graphite (blacklead), 2i lb. best terra castle, 21- gills indigo extract in liquor, 4 gills orchil, 8 oz. red-lead. An ordinary drab for soft hats: 1 lb. common graphite, I lb. best do., 3 gills orchil, 2 gills indigo extract ; put the graphite into a pan, cover with water, and let down with sulphuric acid at 30° Tw. Light beaver : 2 lb. red-lead, 1 oz. indigo extract, 1 lb. common graphite, 2i. lb. terra castle. Rose: 21 lb. commmon graphite, 2 gills indigo extract in liquor, 5 gills orchil. Slate : 4 lb. common graphite, 4 gills indigo extract, 3.1 gills orchil. Cinnamon: 3i lb. red-lead, 2i lb. best terra castle, 2i oz. picric acid, gill indigo extract, 3 pints orchil. The picric acid is first dissolved in hot water, and the other ingredients are added. ' General Ilints.—To give the best results in fine fur hats, all the hoods should be shaved on a lathe before proofing. Many of the best makers assert that this class of goods will retain better colours by being mordanted before placing in the logwood bath.
During the last two years, a demand has arisen for a class of goods for ladies' wear that had not been in demand for 30 years. Many of the old hands had died off, and only a few very far advanced in years could be found to teach the rising generation a process that had almost passed iuto oblivion in this country, viz. roughening or "napping." In this process, after the ordinary body has been proofed, a woollen or fur body will serve the purpose, a long nap of beaver, otter, nutria, or hare fur, finer than that of which the body is made, is selected ; oz. more or less of the uncarroted article is weighed out, being sufficient to cover the whole outside surface of the hat. Taking this with perhaps s oz. of cotton, the two are completely mixed, either by the "hurdle," or by any other suitable process. The two materials completely blended are laid out upon bnards, as evenly as possible. The cotton is used merely to enable the workman to handle the fur, which otherwise would be too thinly spread, and so attenuated of itself, as to preclude its being lifted. This mixture is laid upon the body wet, at the
side of the planking-battery. A little water is sprinkled over it, and it is beaten down with a brush. The hood is taken up carefully with this thiu coating attached, is lapped up in a piece of woollen or coarse horse-hair cloth, and operated upon lightly, and nearly the same as when planking a body. The principal object to be attained is to get the fibres of the fine fur to penetrate the body of the coarser foundation, and take root, as it were, therein. Much experience and care are demanded of the workman at every motion of his hands, to make the points of each fibre of fur penetrate the body.
Se soon as it obtains a secure entry, the fur constantly advances, until after repeated rolling, folding, dipping in hot water, tossing, arid unfolding, it separates itself from the cotton. By this motion, the fur gradually obtains a firm lodgment in the solid felt body, leaving behind the cotton, with which it was mixed at the commencement, loose and valueless. The workman who has not had much experience in this class of work may continue the planking too long, until, in fact, the fur works quite through the body, and is lost. Note should be taken that, in every process of planking, the water, though hot, shmill never boil.
Figs. 827 and 828 show a number of the tools and appliances used in making both felt and silk hats ; they are as follows :—A, box-iron for silk hatters ; B, gas-stove for veluriug both felt and silk hats ; C, brim-heater for shaping curl ; E, brass for curling brim ; F, draw-board for proofing; G, another form of brass for curling; H I, hand-moulds for making fine curl to front of brim ; J, dummy for laying the nap of silk hats, and securing roundurss on the half-block ; K, seaming-block for silk hats ; L, hand-plane for paring or cutting the curls before binding ; M, cutting-board; N, brim-iron ; 0, rounding-maehine ; P, rounding-gauge ; R, brim-stretcher ; S, brim-brush ; T U, split stretehing-blocks for silk hats ; V, steel measure for soft felt hats ; W, tel head-measure ; X, wire card, chiefly for silk hats : Y, wet brush for felt finisher ; Z, large proof-brush for silk hatter ; A', whalebone gauge for caps.
Silk Hats.—The manufacture of the " silk " or " Paris napped" hat was commenced in England about the year 1835, and became fairly developed by 1840. Being so superior in appear ance to the old "beaver" both in style and finish, it soon won public favour, and became generally adopted. But however great an improvement it was upon its predecessor, its introduction was not an unmixed benefit. Although the wearer became possessed of a more graceful-looking hat than previously, the workmen were placed in the unfortunate position of having devoted seven years to acquiring 'a trade which they now saw was rapidly declining, and eventually doomed to become extinct. Tire processes of manufacture not being at all similar, the difficulty of merging the one trade into the other was insurmountable to the majority, and many spent the remainder of their lives in the poorhouse.