Another question.

[Carol]

zanooda wrote:
> > Hi guys, in PS/SS ch.7 there is a sentence I can't fully understand. It's when McGonagall brings in the Sorting hat for the new students to be sorted. Here is the sentence (Harry's thoughts):
> > 
> > "Maybe they had to try and get a rabbit out of it, Harry thought wildly, that seemed the sort of thing - noticing that everyone in the Hall was now staring at the hat, he stared at it too" (p.117 Am.ed. or p.87-88 Br. ed.). 
> > 
> > What I don't understand is this part: "that seemed the sort of thing". What does it even mean? Is it about the Hat? Did the Hat seem like a hat magicians usually get rabbits out of, LOL? I don't understand it, and in every translations that I read translators skipped this part of the sentence (even in the French translation) - I guess they don't understand it either :-). Could anyone explain this, please :-)?
> 
> Geoff:
> I think this refers back to <snip> "Some sort of test, I think..."'
> 
> So Harry is worrying about this possibility. <snip> Hence, as you suggest, Harry's thinking is running along the line of a stage magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Are they expected to do something like that?- that seemed the sort of thing (that he thought 
was likely) - my suggested text.

<snip>

Carol responds:

I agree with Geoff (and Kemper), only I read "that" as a pronoun referring to "get a rabbit out of it [the hat]." So my reading would be, ""Maybe they had to try and get a rabbit out of it, Harry thought wildly[.] [T}hat [pulling a rabbit out of the hat] seemed [like] the sort of thing [that the first-years would be expected to do]." (I've edited out the comma splice in case it contributed to your confusion.) "That seemed the sort of thing" is an elliptical expression, meaning that part of the sentence is omitted (but implied).

I doubt that the Sorting Hat reminded Harry of a Muggle magician's top hat, but his idea of "magic" at this point is probably limited to pulling rabbits out of hats, card tricks, sawing people in half, and making your assistant disappear inside a cabinet. (In his dream later, the Sorting hat turns into Quirrell's turban, so evidently his ideas about hats are rather confused at the moment!)

Carol, hoping she hasn't confused you even more!