Page:Under Dispute (1924).pdf/319

 nature. Readers and play-goers profess themselves tired of it; moralists deprecate its undermining qualities; but the conflict between a normal desire and an interdict is too unadjustable, too rich in circumstance, and too far-reaching in results, to be accepted in sober silence. The complications incidental to prohibition, the battle of wits, the turns of the game, the adventures—often sorry enough—of the players, all present the essential elements of comedy. Mrs. Gerould has likened the situation to an obstacle race. It is that, and it is something more. In earlier, easier days, robbery was made justifiably droll. The master thief was equally at home in northern Europe and in the far East. England smiled at Robin Hood. France evolved that amazing epithet, "chevalier d'industrie." But arrayed against robbery were a moral law and a commandment. Arrayed against wine are a legal ordi-