pay with shortened life, and, oft-times,
with savage usury added.

Intenseness and duration are as ancient enemies as fire and water. They
are mutually destructive. They cannot co-exist. And John Barleycorn,
mighty necromancer though he be, is as much a slave to organic chemistry
as we mortals are. We pay for every nerve marathon we run, nor can John
Barleycorn intercede and fend off the just payment. He can lead us to
the heights, but he cannot keep us there, else would we all be devotees.
And there is no devotee but pays for the mad dances John Barleycorn pipes.

Yet the foregoing is all in after wisdom spoken. It was no part of the
knowledge of the lad, fourteen years old, who sat in the Idler's cabin
between the harpooner and the sailor, the air rich in his nostrils with
the musty smell of men's sea-gear, roaring in chorus: "Yankee ship come
down de ribber--pull, my bully boys, pull!"

We grew maudlin, and all talked and shouted at once. I had a splendid
constitution, a stomach that would digest scrap-iron, and I was still
running my marathon in full vigour when Scotty began to fail and fade.
His talk grew incoherent. He groped for words and could not find them,
while the ones he found his lips were unable to form. His poisoned
consciousness was leaving him. The brightness went out of his eyes, and
he looked as stupid as were his efforts to talk. His face and body
sagged as his consciousness sagged. (A man cannot sit upright save by an
act of will.) Scotty's reeling brain could not control his muscles. All
his correlations were breaking down. He strove to take another drink,
and feebly dropped the tumbler on the floor. Then, to my amazement,
weeping bitterly, he rolled into a bunk on his back and immediately
snored off to sleep.

The harpooner and I drank on, grinning in a superior way to each other
over Scotty's plight. The last flask was opened, and we drank it between
us, to the accompaniment of Scotty's stertorous breathing. Then the
harpooner faded away into his bunk, and I was left alone, unthrown, on
the field of battle.

I was very proud, and John Barleycorn was proud with me. I could carry
my drink. I was a man. I had drunk two men, drink for drink, into
unconsciousness. And I was still on my two feet, upright, making my way
on deck to get air into my scorching lungs. It was in this bout on the
Idler that I discovered what a good stomach and a strong head I had for
drink--a bit