1908 The World's Drinks and How to Mix Them by Hon Wm Boothby

139

WITTY, WISE AND OTHERWISE.

open -a more expensive and better stocked bar in the same location and starve to death. That is probably lack of personality. A dispenser of liquid refreshments should no.t only be a good mixer of drinks but a good "mixer" with his patrons. How many men have tried to imitate another's personality and failed ~ What a man may do successfully depends on his own personality. There are men who can tell off-colored stories and still be gentlemanly, but a double entendre in the mouths of most persons makes you want to hunt up a 'furkisb bath ancl wash off the defilement. It is a hard lesson for one to learn that be cannot do what others can, but it is a most important one. It is personality that counts, but it must be a man's own personality and not another's; ancl it's worth an ambitious bar– tender's while to find out what be may and what be may not do. Taking it all in all, the clerk who gathers the largest receipts is usually the possessor o~ the best personality and should be the best paid, providing, of course, he is economical with stock; but bow f ew saloon attaches ever give this important subject any consideration. When an individual cannot serve a party and keep the bar top clry, he is e~i;ravagant and wasteful, for all that moisture on the mahogany costs money. There is no excuse for ever over– filling a glass with any liquid, for it not only wastes stock but it looks sloppy ancl makes the beverage less inviting. In making cocktails, punches or any other beverage the mixologist who makes a little too much to fill the serving glass each time and then throws the surplus away is a >ery expensive and useless adjunct to a well managed bar. It is more advisable to try and mix too little because after completing the decoction it bas to be handed to the patron, and some of the contents will surely spill while being moved i:fi the glass is too full. Another invaluable hint before adding the word finis to my little dope book, and that is, that whenever a party bas consumed a couple of rounds of drinks, lighten up the next round and continne to make each succeeding round of less material. This little trick not only saves stock but enables and en– courages the consumer to buy oftener ancl stick around longer without becoming incapacitated.

FINIS.