"A very simple agent," remarked Mr. Hobart.

"Yes, the most simple that we can adopt. And what is better, the use
of it leaves no after bad consequences, as is too often the case
with medicines, which act upon the system as poisons."

"Sometimes very bad consequences arise from the use of brandy,"
remarked Mr. Hobart. "I have seen them in my time."

"Drunkenness, you mean."

"Yes."

"People who are likely to make beasts of themselves had better let
it alone," said the doctor, contemptuously. "If they should take the
cholera and die, it will be no great loss to the world."

"And you really think a little good brandy, taken daily, fortifies
the system against the cholera?"

"Seriously I do," replied the doctor. "I have adopted this course
from the first, and have not been troubled with a symptom of the
disease."

"I feel very nervous on the subject. From the first I have been
impressed with the idea that I would get the disease and die."

"That is a weakness, Mr. Hobart."