"THE STOCKWHIP."

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XLIII, Issue 15000, 28 October 1899, Page 2

" THE STOCKWHIP."

« To the Editor. Sir,— Of yoar ensrity permit me space wherein to rep'.y to your correspondent "Lictor" tn to-day's Chronicle. This inspired critic has taken some trouble (a lot I of trouble, judging from his laboured elucidation of allegorical cover of the paper he criticises) to misrepresent the subject of this correspondence Also, in misrepresenting that paper, he misrepresents what he himself wants to say. ' This is not unusual with the desultory letter writer who, firel wilh what he considers a just cause, tangles himself up hopelessly in a web of diction, where the point he* is striving to bring into prominenc-:. is lost in mystical haze. Speaking of the "Old Gentleman" (the devil, I suppose, but why doesn't he say so?), Lictor refers; to him within seven or -eight lines as both. "he" and "she." You see, he started out to explain all about the angel, and got led away by the picture of the devil (or perhaps by the devil himself). Anyhow, he made a devil of a mess of it. Later on "Lictor" assumes that a Prohibitionist was not employed in the drafting of 'the Stockwhip— i-that is qujto. right.; -no Prohibitionist was so employed. The talent of the class appears to lie niore in tho direction of personal recrimination than in. the more useful art of respectable •journalism.. Nevertheless, the Stockwhip is open to receive matter from any s-ource, Prohibitionary or otherwise, and if used it will be paid for. This is no idle boast ; one of the former persuasion may write something, some day, that may be worth printing. ' Apart from the above remarks on what he has said, Lictor's letter does not contain anything that may be replied to. His statement about the sun sinking in the northwest is a mere matter of detail. When th-2 .Stockwhip's sun sinks it will be in some quarter of the compass not vet marked on the map. — I am, etc. , EDITOR STOCKWHIP.