Page:Pleased to Meet You (1927).pdf/106

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

wrapped in a napkin, from which came a rattling sound.

"What ho!" said the Colonel. "How do you like the Dalmatian Admiral? Pretty nifty. I'm giving the Major his first lesson in cocktails. I got the shaker from the hotel at Laubach. They'll send the bill for it to old Leutz. I thought the Republic ought to own one."

He continued to brandish while the others watched in doubtful silence; then he poured three doses of pale yellowish fluid and held out two of them.

"Try that, boys," he said familiarly. "Where I come from that's supposed to be the River of Lethe at high tide."

"In Geneva?" asked the President innocently.

"Geneva!" exclaimed the Colonel scornfully, but then checked himself.—"Yes, exactly. Indeed, Herr President, the word gin is merely an abbreviation of Geneva, as any dictionary will inform. Why the very last thing Ramsay Macdonald said to me was, Teach them to drink