If it was a cold day he took something to keep out the cold, and if it was one of those clear, sunny days that are so dangerous to the system he took whatever the bartender (a recognized health expert) suggested to tone the system up.

After which he could sit down in his office and transact more business, and bigger business, in coal, charcoal, wood, pulp, pulpwood, and woodpulp, in two hours than any other man in the business could in a week.

Naturally so.

For he was braced, and propped, and toned up, and his eyes had been opened, and his brain cleared, till outside of very big business, indeed, few men were on a footing with him.
In fact, it was business itself which had compelled Mr.Rasselyer-Brown to drink.

It is all very well for a junior clerk on twenty dollars a week to do his work on sandwiches and malted milk.