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because of the potent dripped absinthe he served in the
Parisian manner. His drink became so popular that it
won fame not only for Cayetano, but for the balance
of his family as well—papa, mamma, Uncle Leon, and
three sons, Felix, Paul, and Jacinto, who helped to attend
the wants of all and sundry who crowded the place.
What the customers came for chiefly was the emerald
liquor into which, tiny drop by tiny drop, fell water from
the -brass faucets of the pair of fountains that decorated
the long cypress bar. These old fountains, relics of a
romantic past, remained in the Casa ]uncadella for many
years. Came prohibition when the doors of "The Old
Absinthe House" were padlocked by a United States mar
shal, and the contents of the place went under the ham
mer. Pierre Cazebonne purchased the prized antiques,
together with the old bar, and set them up in another
liquid refreshment parlor a block farther down Bourbon
street, where signs now inform the tourist that therein
is to be found the original "Old Absinthe Bar' and anti
que fountains, and we find the marble bases pitted from
the water which fell, drop by drop, from the faucets over
the many years they served their glorious mission.
In these modern years the tourist yearning for an old
flavor of the Old New Orleans to carry back as a memory
of his visit, goes to 400 Bourbon street, not only to see
the venerable fountains and bar, but to be served absinthe
frappe by a son of Cayetano Ferrer, the Spaniard who
established "The Old Absinthe House." Jacinto Ferrer
(we who know him call him "Josh") should indeed
know how to prepare the drink properly for he has been
at it 65 years. Josh served his apprenticeship in his
father's celebrated "Absinthe Room" in W2, and today
at three-score-years-and-ten, carries on with an air the
profession at which he began his apprenticeship as a five-
year-old boy.
Thirty-six