“The moment, now, had arrived for a daiquiri: Seated near the cool drip of the fountain, where a slight stir of air seemed to ruffle the fringed mantone of a bronze dancing Andalusian girl, I lingered over the frigid mixture of [rum], sugar, and a fresh vivid green lime.

It elevated my contentment to an even higher pitch and, with a detached amusement, I recalled the fact that farther north prohibition was formally in effect. Unquestionably the cocktail on my table was a dangerous agent, for it held, in its shallow glass encrusted with undissolved sugar, the power of a contemptuous indifference to fate; it set the mind free of responsibility; obliteration both memory and to-morrow, it gave the heart an adventitious feeling of superiority and momentarily vanquished all the celebrated, the eternal, fears.

Yes, that was the danger of skillfully prepared intoxicating drinks…the word intoxicating adequately expressed their power, their menace to orderly monotonous resignation. A word, I thought further, debased by moralists from its primary ecstatic content. But then, with a fresh daiquiri and a sprig of orange blossoms in my buttonhole, it meant less than nothing.”