WILL THERE BE WAR?

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 201, 28 August 1935, Page 6

WILL THERE BE WAR?

WANGANUI SPECULATES ALWAYS THE SAME ANSWER. ’ ECHO SAYS: “IT IS HARD TO t SAY'. ’ ’ f The whole of Wanganui, from school • maid to taxi driver, is talking war, s and all because of Alussolini and Abys- • sinia! s “Do you think there is likely to be s war?” is a stock phrase the barber r uses at those odd moments when coni versation lags and the topic of tho J weather has been exhausted. r “It’s hard to say,” most customers ’ reply, taking safety in lack of know- - ledge. f “1 don’t think Britain ought lo f close the Suez Canal,” the tram conductor declared yesterday morning, t* “As a matter of fact 1 think Britain 1 will keep out of it as long as she can.” “It is hard to say,” said the bank t clerk, putting his fare in the box. “1 wonder what the Pope thinks ■ about it all?” asked the kitchen maid > as she took the bread from the baker, i “Do you think ho has as much say as ' he used to? in Rome, I mean?” And the baacr, if he was wise, would reply: “It’s hard to tell.” “The war doesn‘t look too good at present, does it/’ said Airs. O’Shanncssy, over tho back fence to Mrs. Brown. “Aly Bill was saying only this morning that it was just such a day as 1 this as how Britain declared war on i uermany. Can’t say as I recollect it that close, but Bill’s got a great i mein’ry for times and things like that. He could tell you the day the Battle of Waterloo was fought and Wellington come t' his doom. Do you think as there’ll be war ia Europe Airs. Brown, you with your two grown-up sons?” “It’s hard to tell,” Airs. Brown replied, shaking her head. “Wonder if old Mussolini’ll have a cut at the blacks?” asked the driver of 567, as she steamed into Aramoho yesterday. His fireman, sitting back waiting for the ordeal of the Fordell Hill, shook his head, just the same as Mrs. Brown did. “It’s hard to say,” he said. . . . “We’ll play at war,” said the eldest lad on holiday from school. “I’ll be Mussolini and we’ll toss for who’s to be the Aybssinians. ” “I wonder who’ll win!” the fairhaired boy piped up. “It’s hard to say, till we get going,” the eldest replied “Have they declared war yet?” asked the old man of the nurse as he came back into the land of more or less complete sense, after having been under the deadening influence ©f chloroform mixed with ether. “Not yet,” the nurse told him gently. “But you don’t think there’ll be war do you? (eagerly). I might be able to go.” “It’s hard to say,” the old man said “Morning, madam,” said the butcher brightly. “What is it to-day? I have a nice roast, shoulder of mutton, or some fresh tripe? Things don’t look too good in Italy, do they? Do you think there’ll be a war?” “It is hard to say,” madam answered, “but I think I’ll have tripe.” “Matters look worse than ever in Europe,” declared the sergeant-major at the Defence Office, scanning the headlines in the “Chronicle.” “I wonder if there’ll be war?” “Y'ou never can tell,” said the quartermaster. And so the speculation goes on, always meeting with the same answer. Perhaps if Mussolini himself was asked about it, or Hitler, or Anthony Edeu, or the King of Abyssinia, each wouid have the same reply: “It is hard to say.”