“More need for me to give you that advice; you shake the bottle as if you’d got the ague. If you spill a drop, now, I’ll—I’ll flatten your big nose on your ugly face.”
Not in the least hurt by such uncomplimentary threats, McCoy smiled as he filled the cup held by his comrade. The spirit was beginning to tell on him, and the smile was of that imbecile character which denotes perfect self-satisfaction and good-will. Having poured the remainder into his own cup, he refixed the bottle to the tube of the “still,” and while more of the liquid was being extracted, the cronies sat down on low stools before the stove, to spend a pleasant evening in poisoning themselves!
It may be interesting and instructive, though somewhat sad, to trace the steps by which those two men, formed originally in God’s image, reduced themselves, of their own free will, to a level much lower than that of the brutes.
“Doesn’t the taste of it bring back old times?” said McCoy, holding his cup to the light as he might have held up a transparent glass.
“Ay,” assented Quintal, gradually becoming amiable, “the good old times before that fool Fletcher Christian indooced us to jine him. Here’s to ’ee, lad, once more.”
“Why, when I think o’ the jolly times I’ve had at the Blue Boar of Plymouth,” said McCoy, “or at the Swan wi’ the two throttles, in—in—I forget where, I feel—I feel—like—like—here’s your health again, Matt Quintal. Give us your flipper, man. You’re not a bad feller, if you wasn’t given to grumpin’ so much.”
Quintal’s amiability, even when roused to excess by drink, was easily dissipated. The free remarks of his comrade did not tend to increase it, but he said nothing, and refreshed himself with another sip.
“I really do think,” continued McCoy, looking at his companion with an intensity of feeling which is not describable, “I really do think that—that—when I think o’ that Blue Boar, I could a’most become poetical.”
“If you did,” growled Quintal, “you would not be the first that had become a big fool on a worse subjec’.”
“I shay, Matt Quintal,” returned the other, who was beginning to talk rather thickly, so powerful was the effect of the liquor on his unaccustomed nerves; “I shay, ole feller, you used to sing well once. Come g–give us a stave now.”