1903 The Flowing Bowl by Edward Spencer

224. THE FLOWING BOWL the Pickwick Papers for the purpose of perusal ? If so, and it was an illustrated edition, the frontis piece must have made his heart quail; for it represents Pickwick himself standing on a chair addressing a more or less excited audience, all seated at a long table, and each with a cigar or pipe in his mouth, and a large tumbler in front of him. And if the eminent abstainer cared to carry his researches farther, he would discover that ere the Pickwickian deputation had started on their first journey they had taken part in a street fight, eventually quelled by the arrival of a perfect stranger, who celebrates the occasion by calling for glasses round of brandy-and-water, hot and strong ! The Pickwick Papers absolutely reek with alcohol, from title-page to name and address of printer. Everybody drinks with everybody else, both inand out of theFleetPrison. The hospitality of the good people is unbounded, and good and bad alike do it full justice. The very instant the belated travellers have crossed the threshold of Dingley Dell they are fed with cherry brandy. The entire deputation has " Katzenjammer," on the morning after their arrival at Rochester, and a duel, or an attempted one, is the consequence. In coffee-room, bar-parlour, or smoking-room, an introduction, a story, or a song is an excuse for a bowl of punch. Wherever the Pickwickians go they carry trouble, more or less amusing to the reader, and the trouble is invariably followed by revelry. That two medical students should wash down their oysters with neat brandy— and before