“So Congress passed a bill abolishin’ th’ canteen.  An’ it’s all right now.  If a sojer wants to desthroy himself he has to walk a block.  Some iv me enterprisin’ colleagues in th’ business have opened places convenient to th’ fort where th’ sons iv Mars, instead iv th’ corroding beer, can get annything fr’m sulphuric acid to knock-out dhrops.  I see wan iv thim stockin’ up at a wholesale dhrug store last week.  If the sojers escape th’ knock-out dhrops they come down-town an’ Doherty takes care iv thim.  A sojer gets thirteen dollars a month, we’ll say.  Twelve dollars he can devote to dhrink an’ wan dollar to th’ fine.  Twelve times eight hundhred an’ twelve times that—­well, ‘tis no small item in th’ coorse iv a year.  Whin th’ Binivolent Assocyation iv Saloonkeepers holds its next meeting I’m goin’ to propose to send dillygates to th’ Young Ladies Christyan Timp’rance Union.  It ought to be what th’ unions call an affilyated organization.”

“Oh, well,” said Mr. Hennessy, “they think they’re doin’ what’s right.”

“An’ they ar-re,” said Mr. Dooley.  “Ye’ll not find me defindin’ th’ sellin’ iv dhrink to anny man annywhere.  There’s no wan that’s as much iv a timp’rance man as a man that’s been in my business f’r a year.  I’d give up all th’ fun I get out iv dhrinkin’ men to escape th’ throuble I have fr’m dhrunkards.  Drink’s a poison.  I don’t deny it.  I’ll admit I’m no betther thin an ordinhry doctor.  Both iv us gives ye something that cures ye iv th’ idee that th’ pain in ye’er chest is pnoomony iv th’ lungs.  If it really is pnoomony ye go off somewhere an’ lie down an’ ayether ye cure ye’ersilf iv pnoomony or th’ pnoomony cures ye iv life.  Dhrink niver made a man betther, but it has made manny a man think he was betther.  A little iv it lifts ye out iv th’ mud where chance has thrown ye; a little more makes ye think th’ stains on ye’er coat ar-re eppylets; a little more dhrops ye back into th’ mud again.  It’s a frind to thim that ar-re cold to it an’ an inimy to those that love it most.  It welcomes thim in an’ thrips thim as they go out.  I tell ye ’tis a threacherous dhrug an’ it oughtn’t to be given to ivry man.

“To get a dhrink a man ought first to be examined be his parish priest to see whether he needs it an’ how it’s goin’ to affect him.  F’r wan man he’d write on th’ prescription ‘Ad lib,’ as Dock O’Leary does whin he ordhers a mustard plasther f’r me; f’r another he’d write:  ’Three times a day at meals.’  But most people he wudden’t prescribe it f’r at all.

“Do I blame th’ ladies?  Faith, I do not.  Ye needn’t think I’m proud iv me business.  I only took to it because I am too selfish to be a mechanic an’ too tender-hearted to be a banker or a lawyer.  No, sir, I wudden’t care a sthraw if all th’ dhrink in th’ wurruld was dumped to-morrah into th’ Atlantic Ocean, although f’r a week or two afther it was I’d have to get me a diving suit if I wanted to see annything iv me frinds.