Luigi drank a couple of glasses of whisky--which steadied his
nerves and clarified his mind, but made Angelo drunk. Everybody who saw
the march, saw that the Champion of the Teetotalers was half seas over,
and noted also that his brother, who made no hypocritical pretensions to
extra temperance virtues, was dignified and sober. This eloquent fact
could not be unfruitful at the end of a hot political canvass. At the
mass-meeting Angelo tried to make his great temperance oration, but was
so discommoded--by hiccoughs and thickness of tongue that he had to give
it up; then drowsiness overtook him and his head drooped against Luigi's
and he went to sleep. Luigi apologized for him, and was going on to
improve his opportunity with an appeal for a moderation of what he called
"the prevailing teetotal madness," but persons in the audience began to
howl and throw things at him, and then the meeting rose in wrath and
chased him home.
This episode was a crusher for Angelo in another way. It destroyed his
chances with Rowena.
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