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I
I
I
OLD
WALDORF BAR DAYS
"And drop upon its grave a tear."
PART I
What
and
Wherefore
"lf
ET WHO
will write the history: of a people, if I am but
L
permitted to write its songs," is something like the
way somebody once put it. That sentime·i:it I can under–
stand and appreciate. But when it comes to "letting
George do it," as a cartoonist taughtt: us to say, I sing in
a different key. Were I to subscribe to a sort of
laissez
faire
with regard to the history of the American people,
. rather than write its songs, or sing them-which latter
might prove more difficult-I should prefer to drink its
drinks.
Not, mind you, the American drinks of to-day. Them
I would not dare tackle-at least, most of them. When I
speak of the drinks of the American people, I mean those
appetizers and stimulative potations of American origin
and invention, which, until the adven't of statutory ref–
ormation, and in what would now seem bewildering
variety and abundance, were to be had by any tree .
citizen, did he know where to go-and had the price.
Indeed, for many years there existed a real and dis–
tinctive American School of Drinking--one that had a
recognized standing, ifnot among ins ti tu tions of learning,
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