And again, lying at the wharf disposing of my oysters, there were dusky twilights when big policemen and plain-clothes men stole on board.

And because we lived in the shadow of the police, we opened oysters and fed them to them with squirts of pepper sauce, and rushed the growler or got stronger stuff in bottles.
Drink as I would, I couldn't come to like John Barleycorn.

I valued him extremely well for his associations, but not for the taste of him.

All the time I was striving to be a man amongst men, and all the time I nursed secret and shameful desires for candy.

But I would have died before I'd let anybody guess it.