There is a little town in Wyoming which, outwardly, is as arid as that waste of desert not so many hundreds of miles away from it. Yet for a consideration one may obtain all the moonshine and gin one desires at another village near by. The lady prohibitionists, all members of the W. C. T. U., as they pass the erstwhile village drunkard (on their way to some sanctimonious meeting), remark what a wonderful thing the cleaning up of the town has been. Poor devil! only a little while ago he was literally in the gutter. Now, look at him, as he sits in the merry sunshine on the porch of the post-office, whittling his life away, where aforetime he drank it away. (They do not know that the poor devil is about the only person in the village--except themselves--who fails to obtain whiskey, though his reasons for the lack are hardly similar to theirs. He simply cannot afford the price.) It costs a few pennies to get to that neighboring wet village; and, after one is there, it costs a little more to procure the stuff he once drank with such avidity. But the flappers--oh, yes, they have them even in Wyoming small towns!--and the boys who are their friends, can dash over in a Ford and get all they want. Concealed on the hip, they feel no lack of stimulation when the evening shadows fall. They do not get tight in public, as the town drunkard used to do--not at all. But they are up to all the tricks of sly drinking. If they were burglars, they would be called sneak-thieves. America has taught them a thing or two; and where the previous generation, at their age, never dreamed of taking a cocktail, they think of nothing else, and will get it at any price. This is true the country over. But the obviously enforced reformation of many a village souse is pointed to as perfect evidence that all is well. I suppose those virtuous W. C. T. U. ladies go to bed o’ nights and sleep serenely, happy in the consciousness that they have helped the race. And even as they slumber, hip-flasks are opened, corks are popping, and an enjoyable time is being had by all. Thus do reformers blind themselves to conditions as they are. The village drunkard, tottering to his grave, has been reformed--if he was worth reforming at all--while the arriving host of youth is dancing and singing and jazzing its way “down the primrose path to the everlasting bonfire.” This is but another evidence of our national hypocrisy. And not content with making the land dry--which we haven’t done at all--we must go out and make the sea dry. Our holier-than-thou attitude has caused us to lose our sense of humor, verily; for to dry up the ocean is going Moses and the children of Israel one better. Moreover, the day of miracles is past.