MUDDLED MASTERTON.

Free Lance, Volume XIV, Issue 692, 4 October 1913, Page 6

MUDDLED MASTERTON.

The Problem of the Drunks' Train. AT Eketahuna recently a man was charged-with being found drunk in a railway carriage. One of the witnesses, a guard, admitted that it was an offence for the officials to permit a drunken man to board a train, but stated that it was almost impossible under existing conditions to avert • it. 4.xT e % r h Z. *? e dozen *" ho said, "get into the Masterton train at Carterton in a state of intoxication, and they cannot bo prevented, as they always hold a return ticket, and their condition is not detected until the train has started." * .*■ »' »• _ . This is shocking: but" the reason of it is surely, very plain. "When a man in Masterton wants a drink, he has to travel far to get one; and when he gets it he never knows quite how long ft will be before he has a chance of getting it again. So he loads up and.up and up Tin his despair, until he sinks exhausted into the train that takes him back to his and vale. The whole trouble thus arises from the excessive dryneEs of Mastertpn, and it is plain that Masterton would do well to moisten a bit. ■ —-