"Yes, indeed," he continued, "you ought to have seen him balancing the books. Why, he could keep the day-book in the air while he juggled the ledger on his nose and totaled up the journal with either right or left hand. Oh, he was fine, but pop had to let him go."
"How was that?" I asked.
"He was too much of an adept at the horizontal bar."
"Yes," I remarked, "that same bar has doubtless been the cause of many a fine fellow's downfall. But it is becoming the fashion now among men who lead a strenuous life to give up their tippling. I was just reading that Santos Dumont, the celebrated Brazilian air-ship navigator, does not indulge at all."
"Quite right," remarked Rickets, soberly; "probably he is afraid of taking a drop too much."
There's poor old Juggins, who used to be a great friend of mine till he took to drink.
I knew he would get his desserts if he continued his habit of a periodical spree, and the other day sure enough he turned up in the pen when the cases of drunk and disorderly were called.
"Officer," said the police-court judge, "what made you think the prisoner was drunk?"