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OldWaldorf Bar Days
and the expression "give him the raspberry" had not
come into common use. Nor had "strawberries" entered
the realm of slang. Berries were berries and fruits were
fruits. It was a simpler age. A pimola was a green olive
stuffed with pimento.
A few processes employed by professors in the Amer–
ican School of Drinking, and named here and there,
seem to call for some clarifica tion.
For example, to "muddle" meant to mash and stir up
one or more ingredients, and had no objective reference
to the person who was getting the drink; to "cup" meant
either to shape or use as a cup, or to place in the bottom
of a cup or glass; to "frappe" meant to cool with ice.
More frequently than not, a bar-tender averse to the
vigorous and more than local exercise demanded by ply–
ing a cocktail-shaker achieved a similar effect by the
finger-and-wrist method of gently stirring a few lumps
of ice with a spoon.
Two terms ofliquid measurement employed may need
explanation to the younger generation. A "split," for in–
stance, did not necessarily concern a Terpsichorean
achievement or divertisement, bµt simply meant half an
ordinary bottle of aerated or flavored
H20,
or else a bot–
tle of half the regular size. A "dash" demands more elab–
orate definition. Often in a bottle-neck was a device that
held a metal quill. A "dash," in the sense of measure–
ment, was the quantity of liquid discharged from the
bottle when the. bar-tender, eleva ting the vessel shoul–
d~-high,
pointed it in the direction of the mixture he
was concocting, and brought it down sharply and swiftly
to within a few inches of the same. By carefully gauging
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