Saturday, September 14, 2013

 

A Famous Good Thing for Us All

Jane Austen (1775-1819), Northanger Abbey, chapter IX (John Thorpe and Catherine Morland speaking):
"Lord help you! You women are always thinking of men's being in liquor. Why, you do not suppose a man is overset by a bottle? I am sure of this—that if everybody was to drink their bottle a day, there would not be half the disorders in the world there are now. It would be a famous good thing for us all."

"I cannot believe it."

"Oh! Lord, it would be the saving of thousands. There is not the hundredth part of the wine consumed in this kingdom that there ought to be. Our foggy climate wants help."
Hat tip: Mrs. Laudator, who has been reading Northanger Abbey aloud to me.



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