A MATTER OF HATS

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 71, 25 March 1931, Page 13

A MATTER OF HATS

HOW DO BERETS HANG-ON?

"Time was, my children, when fine ladies wore hats. I well remember the Duchess of B— - — finding a rook trying to hatch out the moth-balls in the one she was to wear at Ascot," says "Phipps," in the "Daily Mail." "But that was in 1903. - Since the days of tEat haughty herbaceous, headgear, women's hats have shrunk, and tho accent, from being 'acute, has become grave. . ■ "The final creation is called, I understand, a beret. It .was born in. tho Pyrenees, geared on motor-cyclists, and now exists as. a fashionable: parasitic growth on tho.back of female heads. I keep feeling' air urge to rush up with I an oyster kuifo and prise one off. What exists- under that strange- "tumulus?! Some benevolent-bivalve, or merely a safety pin? lam convinced' there must be something. Otherwise, how does it hajig. oil-? ■■--. ■ .-■- ■ "Thu'so berets.may, .unfortunately, be obtained, in all colours from Underground black.to", stockbroker-blue. And to make matters worse, many of them are speckled. I approachfld- a Modern Girl on the subject. :'Why are. these berets so popular?' 'Well/'they'ro comfortable and smart, especially for girls with oval, faces.' .'But why are they worn on the back of the head' 'Well, I we're' not Bhowing so much leg those days—' T)on't rub' it in.' 'So we're showing more head.',So you see I didn't exactly unravel -the mystery. But I suspect. that tho origin of thn craze \v;ig women's constitutional dislike of one another. One puts on a beret. And her neighbour has to put on a bigger one, or a. brighter ono, or a more expensive one. All I can say is I wish they would beret the hatchet in this ease."