TO SMOKE OR NOT TO SMOKE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 131, 26 February 1908, Page 9

TO SMOKE OR NOT TO SMOKE.

A BY-LAW FOR THE WHARVES. , The Harbour Board was troubled yesterday, about smoking on tho wharves. Its solicitors had drafted a by-law providing,that: .. "No 'person shall smoke on or about ; any wharf, or in ,or about aiiy . storo, . •; except in or on any ; portion" of any, 'ouch ; wharf ,or store set : apart,;for ..the: pur- .. pose." ';'..■!. ; It - was .explained .that' the place set apart 'was the' employees': waiting-room.;. . Several •members -thought .such a by-law.: would be no'edlessly ■ drastic. -. v ' ... i^.' The new Chairman (Mr. Wilford) drew-a disquieting picturo of an officious-police corlgtable.'trying to stop :a- long procession of .oversea: passongerß, who'were supposed, for purposes .; of'' argument, to be' disembarking froni a liner and hurrying, to the cityi . - : '■ v Mr. Fletcher completed tho sketch by put-' ting,in, with- A 'fow bold strokes,,the .figures ,of'all tho Board's employees assisting, as' in duty.bound, the officious-police constable. Mr.' C. W,'Jones sadly murmured some rc'miniscenees about a similar by-law that existed somewhere. else—but only on paper; people-snioked'copiously in spite of' it. , ~ Mr. Cohen "wanted to have the places wliero smoking waa forbidden' i indicated by large notieo boards.' ; ■ The Chairman .thought the case might be met by prohibiting smoking "in or about any stores or a'djacent"to anw cargo."/ ■' Mr. Harkness, who was - for a policy, of "thorough," .quoted as' a precedent,the 'regulation against spioliinf* at railway stations,, but other members replied'that this, regulation was a doad: letter, and one of' them-said he always smoked on the platform. At last the Hon. Kennedy Macdonald uttered a happy thoughts-postpone it. • Tho Board agreed with alacrity. (