(1) _Taking the Measurements_—The customer’s head (preferably shaved) is measured with a strip of paper about an inch wide, each measurement being recorded by a scissor-nick in the edge of the strip. There are five essential dimensions to take: (a) from the top center of the forehead over the head to the nape of the neck; (b) from one temple to the other around the back of the head; (c) over the top of the head from ear to ear (to the top of the ears for a wig “with ears,” i.e., with ears showing, to the middle of the ears for a half-eared wig, and to the bottom of the ears for a full-bottomed wig); (d) from the middle of either cheek to the back of the head; and (e) from the top center of the forehead to either temple. [Illustration: _The illustrations on this page come from François-Alexandre-Pierre de Garsault’s _The Art of the Wigmaker_, published in France in 1767. At the top is a hackle, with two parcels of hair being combed through it. Next are shears, curling pins, and a cylindrical oven for heating and drying curls. The instrument below the hackle is a wigmaker’s vise attached to a table top. Most prominent in the lower picture is the six-thread weaving frame, with hair strands of two different lengths tied to the lower threads. Above it and to the left are the various knots employed. The odd-shaped pattern at the lower left with each parallel line bearing several numbers produced a wig to fit the head of some eighteenth-century gentleman._] (2) _Preparing the Hair_—Before it can be used in wigmaking, hair must be cleaned, arranged according to length, quality, and color, and curled. Tied in small parcels, the hair is cleaned by thorough powdering with fine sand or mill dust from a flour mill; this absorbs the oil and grease from the hair and is then shaken out. Next the hair is combed or carded through a “hackle” and separated into parcels of different lengths. The wigmaker’s vise, fixed to the table top in a horizontal position, holds each parcel of hair in turn (by the root ends) while the craftsman rolls the hair—in a curl-paper—onto curling pins made of pipe clay. These rolls he boils for three hours and then partially dries in a small charcoal oven. The loaded curlers are then piled up, taken to the bakery, covered with a shell of rye dough, and baked in a moderate oven. When the loaf is returned to the wig shop and broken open, the curls will have absorbed some moisture from the dough and must again be dried out in the charcoal oven. Finally dried and cooled, the curled hair can be taken off the pins and combed out in the hackle, further separated by lengths if necessary, and the root ends of each parcel trimmed off evenly. If the hair is thin and needs to be filled out with horsehair, or if hair of different colors is to be mixed to achieve a desired shade, this is the time to do it.