Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1920-03-02

on the bar; and the panied customer is forced
to lose little more in conveying the drink
to his lips. If a waiter handles it, there is
still further leakage as he trots along with
his tray gracefully balanced on two or three
fingers, it's decks awash with stuff which is
worth more than it's weight in gold just ninety
miles north Newcomers from the United
States have been known to break down and
weep at the spectacle of this waste of a
precious substance 1T has been estimated
that if every Cuban barkeeper could be sent
to the interior of North America for six
months, he would acquire an attitude toward
ethyl alcohol which would ultimately save
millions to his employer.
In the principal hotels here you can get
almost any kind of drink known to civilized
man for relatively high price resembling
those paid in New York and other big cities
while wartime prohibition was in force, but
before the amendment became effective. BY
going around the corner TO a native bar, you
can obtain exactly the same drinks, for about
one-half as, much. This puts the visiting
bibbler on the horns of dilemma. The bar
keepers in the big hotels are the only ones
who speak English. After he has been here
about four days, what the American tourist
Graves above all things is to find some one
who can cater to his wants in his own Ian
guage, while if he wants some drink not gen.
eraly made in these parts, the English-speak-
ing barkeeper is about his only hope. At the
same time, the well-knoWn Yankee instinct
for bargain is on the job, so that he cannot
refrain from trying sign language and ges-
lures in the low rate emporiums 1t is really
quite show to watch a man from Detroit,
who does not know any more Spanish than a
monkey, trying to order a horses neck from
a non-En glish-speaking Cuban barkeeper. He
points at bottles, utters names, goes through
motions. The native listens gravely He is
not a mind reader, but he has imagination
and is born gambler. He mixes up seven or
eight kinds of liquor, shakes the mixture with
ice adds an olive and piece of orange peel
and politely offers it to the customer The
customer takes one sip, makes terrible face
and begins all over again. This time he
shouts the name of the ingredients in loud
vaice as though hopeful that mere noise
might serve to make an idea penetrate for
eign understanding. The barkeeper, all un-
furried nonchalantly empties his first effort
into the Stops, and prepares to start all over.
BY this tome small crowd of natives has
collected-not an amused laughing crowd
such as an American bar would draw under
similar circumstances, but a grave, polite
crowd, anxious only that the stranger shall
have what he wants. Several interpreters
volunteer, each of them equipped with about
six words~of English, and the very best OF
intentions. The American by this time is red
in the face, and cursing the entire island OF
Cuba, but still determined. He finally gets
! what he wants. after running about pint OF
assorted liquors and his own temper, but
without having disturbed the polite equan1m1-
| ty of the natives in the least.
"But | thought that they searched every
vessel as soon as she made port, and put all
alcoholic liuuor under lock and key until she
sailed again. said the man from the north.