Drippings From the Fawcett
Three weeks of Havana’s cliquot, bacardi, cervesa, horse races, jai alai, casino, and the rattly-bang-bang, of garbage cans, piercing shrieks of peddlers, not to mention rip-snorting roaring and exhausted automobiles, have had their exhilarating effects on the usual hum drum existence that has been my part of living on a quiet Minnesota farm. The contrast is pleasant although somewhat tiresome. There’s been too much excitement for the little old editor of this family journal of travel.
Sometime in the dim and distant past I was told that the most difficult feature in writing was to transcribe the first paragraph. My hardest job here is to stay away from the Scotch and soda long enough to even think what the first paragraph will look like. However, with the able assistance of my good old pals, the Haig brothers, I am at last seated by a rickety old dining room table in an apartment overlooking the Malecon, Morro Castle and the Gulf of Mexico.
Confucius once said: “It is not the wine that makes a man drunk—it is the man himself.” This filosophy applies to Cuba today. I have seen more “saloons” in Havana and fewer intoxicated persons than in any city in the United States, both before and since the adoption of the prohibition amendment.
The easy manner in which we Americans can get borie-eyed drunk on a few shots of moonshine reminds of the Wag Jag ditty about
DeGulick McBlue, psychological stew,
Could always get tight on one small shot or two—
Far from proving his worldliness, toughness and such.
It all went to show that he couldn’t stand much.