HAMLET ON THE WARPATH.

NZ Truth, Issue 685, 27 July 1918, Page 6

HAMLET ON THE WARPATH.

There's a chap down this way called Hamlet — Joseph Hamlet. He runs a motor garage or something, and has a penchant for writing to the newspapers on any old subject, from chicken raising to banking. AH things wowseristic are Joseph's pet aversions, and, possibly, this was what prompted him to come to tight the other day with a three-column dissertation on the direful consequences that will follow m the wake of National Prohibition. The "Sun" was the obliging journal which (m these days of paper shortage, too), furnished the publicity medium. To Joseph's delight, his three-column effusion was taken very seriously by the dour humorless folk who pretend to have at heart the interests of the community when endeavoring to push their kill-joy doctrines down New Zealanders' necks. They were obviously put out by Joe's championing of Mr. Booze, and replied m phrases that were as vitriolic as they were indignant. Hamlet rubbed his hands with delight, sent out another search party over his limitless vocabulary, manufactured another string of "quotations," sharpened his pencil and prepared for a strenuous campaign against the legions of wow/ serism. Then, at the tail-end of the week, Joe got a blast fijom an altogether unexpected quarter. An anonymous correspondent, who claimed to have "Inflicted upon prohibitionists some of the bitterest disappointments they have ever . experienced- — and that long before Joe began to dazzle Christchurch with hia literary brilliancy — : had the audacity to say that the cause (Mr. Booze's cause) would be the stronger for "Mr. Hamlet's" silence. (He persisted m writing "Mr. Hamlet" between inverted commas). He reckoned that Joe's yarn might please the frequenters of. tap-rooms, but thought that Joe would be better advised to give his brains a chance and his tongue a rest. This rebuke, from one of his own, rather took the wind out of Hamlet's /sails, but it is to be hoped, for the sake of that section of the people who don't take life; too seriously, that the Irrepressible antagonist of wowserism will up and smite hit now opponent hip and thlfh.