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Page 27
Fierce was in a few days brought to his trial at the Old Bailey,
where, to his great confusion, his old friend Sly appeared against
him, as did Miss Straddle. His only hopes were now in the
assistances which our hero had promised him. These unhappily
failed him: so that, the evidence being plain against him, and he
making no defence, the jury convicted him, the court condemned
him, and Mr. Ketch executed him.
With such infinite address did this truly great man know how to
play with the passions of men, to set them at variance with each
other, and to work his own purposes out of those jealousies and
apprehensions which he was wonderfully ready at creating by means
of those great arts which the vulgar call treachery, dissembling,
promising, lying, falsehood, &c., but which are by great men
summed up in the collective name of policy, or politics, or rather
pollitrics; an art of which, as it is the highest excellence of
human nature, perhaps our great man was the most eminent master.
CHAPTER SIX
OF HATS.
Wild had now got together a very considerable gang, composed of
undone gamesters, ruined bailiffs, broken tradesmen, idle
apprentices, attorneys' clerks, and loose and disorderly youth,
who, being born to no fortune, nor bred to any trade or
profession, were willing to live luxuriously without labour. As
these persons wore different PRINCIPLES, i.e. HATS, frequent
dissensions grew among them. There were particularly two parties,
viz., those who wore hats FIERCELY cocked, and those who preferred
the NAB or trencher hat, with the brim flapping over their eyes.
The former were called CAVALIERS and TORY RORY RANTER BOYS, &c.;
the latter went by the several names of WAGS, roundheads,
shakebags, old-nolls, and several others. Between these, continual
jars arose, insomuch that they grew in time to think there was
something essential in their differences, and that their interests
were incompatible with each other, whereas, in truth, the
difference lay only in the fashion of their hats. Wild, therefore,
having assembled them all at an alehouse on the night after
Fierce's execution, and, perceiving evident marks of their
misunderstanding, from their behaviour to each other, addressed
them in the following gentle, but forcible manner: [Footnote:
There is something very mysterious in this speech, which probably
that chapter written by Aristotle on this subject, which is
mentioned by a French author, might have given some light into;
but that is unhappily among the lost works of that philosopher. It
is remarkable that galerus, which is Latin for a hat, signifies
likewise a dog-fish, as the Greek word kuneae doth the skin of
that animal; of which I suppose the hats or helmets of the
ancients were composed, as ours at present are of the beaver or
rabbit. Sophocles, in the latter end of his Ajax, alludes to a
method of cheating in hats, and the scholiast on the place tells
us of one Crephontes, who was a master of the art. It is
observable likewise that Achilles, in the first Iliad of Homer,
tells Agamemnon, in anger, that he had dog's eyes. Now, as the
eyes of a dog are handsomer than those of almost any other animal,
this could be no term of reproach. He must therefore mean that he
had a hat on, which, perhaps, from the creature it was made of, or
from some other reason, might have been a mark of infamy. This
superstitious opinion may account for that custom, which hath
descended through all nations, of shewing respect by pulling off
this covering, and that no man is esteemed fit to converse with
his superiors with it on. I shall conclude this learned note with
remarking that the term old hat is at present used by the vulgar
in no very honourable sense.]--"Gentlemen, I am ashamed to see men
embarked in so great and glorious an undertaking, as that of
robbing the public, so foolishly and weakly dissenting among
themselves. Do you think the first inventors of hats, or at least
of the distinctions between them, really conceived that one form
of hats should inspire a man with divinity, another with law,
another with learning, or another with bravery? No, they meant no
more by these outward signs than to impose on the vulgar, and,
instead of putting great men to the trouble of acquiring or
maintaining the substance, to make it sufficient that they
condescend to wear the type or shadow of it. You do wisely,
therefore, when in a crowd, to amuse the mob by quarrels on such
accounts, that while they are listening to your jargon you may
with the greater ease and safety pick their pockets: but surely to
be in earnest, and privately to keep up such a ridiculous
contention among yourselves, must argue the highest folly and
absurdity. When you know you are all PRIGS, what difference can a
broad or a narrow brim create? Is a prig less a prig in one hat
than in another? If the public should be weak enough to interest
themselves in your quarrels, and to prefer one pack to the other,
while both are aiming at their purses, it is your business to
laugh at, not imitate their folly. What can be more ridiculous
than for gentlemen to quarrel about hats, when there is not one
among you whose hat is worth a farthing? What is the use of a hat
farther than to keep the head warm, or to hide a bald crown from
the public? It is the mark of a gentleman to move his hat on every
occasion; and in courts and noble assemblies no man ever wears
one. Let me hear no more therefore of this childish disagreement,
but all toss up your hats together with one accord, and consider
that hat as the best, which will contain the largest booty." He
thus ended his speech, which was followed by a murmuring applause,
and immediately all present tossed their hats together as he had
commanded them.
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