Whisky decanters were always in the room where I wrote, and for months and years I never knew what it was, when by myself, to take a drink.
When out at dinner I noticed the kindly, genial glow of the preliminary cocktail.

It seemed a very fitting and gracious thing.

Yet so little did I stand in need of it, with my own high intensity and vitality, that I never thought it worth while to have a cocktail before my own meal when I ate alone.
On the other hand, I well remember a very brilliant man, somewhat older than I, who occasionally visited me.

He liked whisky, and I recall sitting whole afternoons in my den, drinking steadily with him, drink for drink, until he was mildly lighted up and I was slightly aware that I had drunk some whisky.

Now why did I do this?
I don't know, save that the old schooling held, the training of the old days and nights glass in hand with men, the drinking ways of drink and drinkers.
Besides, I no longer feared John Barleycorn.