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INTRODUCTION

edition of TheBon Vivant's Companion,but in the last print

ing the Archbishop,the Cardinal and the Pope were omitted,

because of protests from the various Protestant denomina

tions, which complained that the proportion of four Roman

Catholic drinks to one Protestant was unreasonable and

unfair.

Ill

Professor Thomas left the Metropolitan in 1859 to brave

the dangers of a transatlantic voyage, but he was both sea

sick and homesick, and in less than a year he was again in

New York,and at Broadway and Washington Place opened

the most ornate barroom in the metropolis. But within

another twelve months the wanderlust led him in a covered

wagon to San Francisco, where he was Principal Bartender

in the Occidental Hotel for almost two years.Then he joined

a wagon train to Virginia City, Nevada Territory, where

he introduced sound drinking practices and amassed another

small fortune in gold dust. In 1865 lie returned to New

York,and thereafter roamed no more.

He opened a barroom at Broadway and Twenty-second

Street which became one of the most celebrated saloons in

the history of the city, and was frequented by the best

citizens. Thomas Nast was then a young man struggling to

find his place in the field of art, and Professor Thomas gra

ciously extended a helping hand and opened his back room

to the first exhibition of Nast cartoons. A hundred carica

tures of prominent personages were displayed upon the

walls, and Nast leaped into instant popularity. Later Ned

Mullin, a brilliant but dissipated caricaturist, also exhibited

his work in Professor Thomas's art gallery, as did Theodore

Wust and Junmp, clever draughtsmen who had been dis

covered in San Francisco by the Professor and brought

to New York to make their little artistic splashes.

After seven years of continuous success and popularity,

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