“Juleps were his choice—I’ve heard of a part of the country, somewhere about Virginny, I believe it is, where tee-totallers make an exception in favour of juleps—it may do _there_, Squire Dunscomb, but it won’t do _here_. No liquor undoes a body, in this part of the country, sooner than mint juleps. I will find you ten constitutions that can hold out ag’in brandy, or plain grog, or even grog, beer and cider, all three together, where you can find me one that will hold out ag’in juleps. I always set down a reg’lar julep fancier as a case—that is, in this part of the country.” “Very true, my good landlady, and very sensible and just. I consider you a sensible and just woman, whose mind has been enlarged by an extensive acquaintance with human nature——” “A body does pick up a good deal in and around a bar, ’Squire Dunscomb!” “Pick up, indeed—I’ve known ’em picked up by the dozen myself. And Peter _would_ take the juleps?” “Awfully fond of them! He no more dared to take one at home, however, than he dared to go and ask Minister Watch to make him one. No, he know’d better where the right sort of article was to be had, and always came down to our house when he was dry. Horton mixes stiff, or we should have been a good deal better off in the world than we are—not that we’re mis’rable, as it is. But Horton takes it strong himself, and he mixes strong for others. Peter soon found this out, and he fancied his juleps more, as he has often told me himself, than the juleps of the great Bowery-man, who has a name for ’em, far and near. Horton _can_ mix a julep, if he can do nothing else.” “And Peter Goodwin was in the habit of frequenting your house privately, to indulge this propensity.” “I’m almost ashamed to own that he did—perhaps it was sinful in us to let him; but a body must carry out the idee of trade—our trade is tavern-keeping, and it’s our business to mix liquors, though Minister Watch says, almost every Sabbath, that professors should do nothing out of sight that they wouldn’t do before the whole congregation. I don’t hold to that, however; for it would soon break up tavern-keeping altogether. Yes, Peter did drink awfully, in a corner.” “To intoxication, do you mean, Mrs. Horton?” “To delirrum tremus, sir—yes, full up to that. His way was to come down to the village on the pretence of business, and to come right to our house, where I’ve known him to take three juleps in the first half-hour. Sometimes he’d pretend to go to town to see his sister, when he would stay two or three days upstairs in a room that Horton keeps for what he calls his _cases_—he has given the room the name of his _ward_—hospital-ward he means.” “Is the worthy Mr. Horton a member of the meeting also, my good landlady?” Mrs. Horton had the grace to colour; but she answered without stammering, habit fortifying us in moral discrepancies much more serious than even this.