“Let me tell you,” said the teacher. “The first time they try it they cannot help disliking it, and they should take the hint to let it alone altogether. But if they keep drinking it in spite of their horror, it will lead to a very strange result. Their nature gradually gets changed, till a time comes when they cannot do without a drink that made them shudder when they tasted it first. It is that way with beer and brandy, and even with a drink made of that very wormwood that would have made your deer sick if it had eaten it. Just rub one of those leaves between your fingers, and then put the tip of your finger to your tongue. That is just exactly the taste of a stuff called absinthe, and brandy and strong beer are almost as bad.” “You say people get fond of it if they drink it again and again,” mused Tommy, “but what makes them do that, I wonder? What makes them try it at all?” “They see other people do it,” said the teacher, “and so they try it themselves, and keep on trying, because they think Mr. So-and-so ought to know better than nature. Their own nature warns them against it, but they do not mind that warning, and keep on till it is too late to turn back. Now you might ask me to tell you who first took it in his head to make himself sick with such a foolish habit. That seems a puzzle, indeed, but it has been explained in this way. Before people drank wine they drank the fresh juice of grapes—‘must,’ as they call it—and probably tried to keep some of it in bottles and jars. Now in warm weather sweet juices of that sort are very apt to spoil—they ferment, as it is called, and their pleasant taste becomes sharp and disagreeable. Some stingy housekeeper in old times may have forced his servants to drink that spoiled stuff rather than throw it away, and after a while they got fond of it, and the foolish habit spread all over the country. Now wine is nothing but fermented or spoiled must. Beer is fermented barley water. They let barley get soaked in water, and then mix it and stir till it gets that sharp taste that made you sick when you tried it by mistake in that summer hotel last year.” “Yes; and on that same trip I once got in the wrong railway car,” said Tommy, “and that car was full of tobacco smoke enough to make my little brother cry, and I thought it would choke me before the train stopped and we got back in the right car. I know a boy who got so sick he had to go to bed when he first tried to smoke; but I am sure I shall never try it at all.” [Illustration: SHE’S SUCH A DARLING!] “That’s right, Tommy; let such things alone altogether,” said the teacher. “It’s very easy never to begin, but if you should get fond of such bad habits you might find it hard to get rid of them.”