THE BONNET. – No man – unless he is a
man-milliner – can comprehend the niceties of a bonnet, although
he may talk aesthetic nonsense about it by the hour. He sees in it only
something to be paid for. In conversing with a lady, it is the face
and not the bonnet that he regards. The face he may treasure up in his
memory – if it is a pretty one – but of the bonnet, whether
it is pretty or not, he does not carry away the remotest idea. The lady
may meet him with three new bonnets on the same day, and he not know
apart. But no new bonnet ever comes before a lady’s eye unchallenged
and uncriticised. When ladies converse with each other it is not the
face that each studies, but the bonnet. Her glance sweeps over that
cunning work of flowers, feathers, laces, and ribbons, which rise in
graceful arch above the head of her friend. Nothing escapes this survey,
at top or bottom, back or front. She has resolved the bonnet into its
original elements. Her memory retains every item, even the minutest,
of which it is composed. At any subsequent period of her life she could
draw upon her recollection, and have a perfect duplicate of her friend’s
bonnet made is she desired it. This feat, which is incomprehensible
to a man is a natural gift of the bonneted set.
