1903 The Flowing Bowl by Edward Spencer

129

"THE BOY'

after indulging somewhat freely in the "sparlc- ling" proffered me on the previous day in a booth on Knavesmire. Do what I would—and I walked ten miles, went for a scull on the river Ouse, and then swallowed hot mustard-and-water —the distressing sensations, the great wave of depression which seemed to have swamped the heart, would not quit the body, until—and the idea came as a bolt from the blue—I had sum moned up sufficient strength of mind to enter the coffee-room of the principal hotel, and demand a pint of Pommery. It was not a hair of the dog which had bitten me; the mangy brute from the attention of whose fangs I was suffering was no sort of relation to the highly- bred terrier who rooted out the anguish from my soul. And that small pint was so successful that another went the same way. And by that time I had been inspired with nerve enough to face a charging tiger, unarmed. Many learned people, including one section of the medical profession, incline to the belief that consumption of champagne offers direct en couragement to gout. But there is no such idea amongst those employed in the cellars of Moet et Chandon, Geisler, Mum, Pommery, and other large firms. Not that these workmen are allowed to drink as much of their own foaming productions as they have a mind to. As a matter of fact the wine supplied to the ouvriers is the thin red stuff of the district, resembling inferior Burgundy, and not of a very elevating nature. It is not particularly attractive, this life of labour, for nine or ten hours a day, in a damp, cold

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