Traditional Slavic sour drink.
1I have soiled my belly with quass, and hooch, and 'Three Star.'
2And each spoke friendly words and said that the quass was good, till all had drunk.
3In the middle was the barrel of quass, and by it a slave to serve the drink.
4This quass-feast was for the chiefs, and the chiefs only, and there was a score of them.
5To not say that the quass was good were insult; to spit forth upon the ground were worse than insult.
6But first of all, there was to be a meeting of the chiefs with Niblack, and a drowning of all enmities in quass.
7Samuel Quass, the landlord of the Sailor's Rest, was next called.
8Reficimus rates quassas: we tempt the ocean again and again, and try upon new ventures.
9As Bolton had vanished next morning, Quass obeyed instructions, with the result which everyone knew.
10"Life was too short," grumbled Quass, "to be bothered in that way."
11The Coroner asked all manner of questions, and so did Inspector Date; but all attempts to incriminate Quass were vain.
12Quass was glad when he saw the plump back of the cross little man, who so pertinaciously followed what everyone else had abandoned.