We are entirely unconcerned with morality. This book is for the delight of the converted : to the unconverted it is as likely to prove an Awful Warning as an Incitement to Carouse. Our object being to amuse, we could wish, with the immortal Mr. Keith, that " the English still possessed a shred of the old sense of humour which Puritanism, and dyspepsia, and newspaper-reading, and tea-drinking have nearly extinguished. It ought to be revived afresh. Noth- ing like a good drunkard for that purpose. As a laughter- provoking device it is cheaper and more effective than any pantomime yet invented ; and none the worse, surely, for being a little old-fashioned ? " Alas, that such a fashion should ever grow old But in spite of all the efforts of our rulers to make us realise that " THE OLD DAYS OF THE RIGHT OF EVERY MAN TO DO AS HE LIKES WITH HIS OWN ARE A RELIC OF THE EIGH- TEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES AND WILL NOT WORK in the twentieth," there are still certain stalwarts (as has been most abundantly proved by some of our acquain- tance) who temulently emulate the feats of valiance des- cribed in these pages, which we fling, symbolically, with the worst will in the world, full in the face of every advocate of Prohibition. RAB NOOLAS IN THE BEGINNING ND Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard : and he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.
