"You've gone the pace, young man," said the venerable family doctor,
tapping his patient with the stethoscope. "Gone the pace, and now nature
is clamoring for her long-deferred payment."

The major was present, and Garrison felt the hot blood surge to his
face, as the former's eyes were riveted upon him.

"Youth is a prodigal spendthrift," put in the major sadly. "But isn't it
hereditary, doctor? Perhaps the seed was cultivated, not sown, eh?"

"Assiduously cultivated," replied Doctor Blandly dryly. "You'll have to
get back to first principles, my boy. You've made an oven out of your
lungs by cigarette smoke. You inhale? Of course. Quite the correct
thing. Have you ever blown tobacco smoke through a handkerchief? Yes?
Well, it leaves a dark-brown stain, doesn't it? That's what your
lungs are like--coated with nicotine. Your wind is gone. That is why
cigarettes are so injurious. Not because, as some people tell you, they
are made of inferior tobacco, but because you inhale them. That's where
the danger is. Smoke a pipe or cigar, if smoke you must; those you don't
inhale. Keep your lungs for what God intended them for--fresh air. Then,
your vitality is nearly bankrupt. You've made an old curiosity-shop out
of your stomach. You require regular sleep--tons of it----"

"But I'm never sleepy," argued Garrison, feeling very much like a
schoolboy catechised by his master. "When I wake in the morning, I awake
instantly, every faculty alert--"

"Naturally," grunted the old doctor. "Don't you know that is proof
positive that you have lived on stimulants? It is artificial. You should
be drowsy. I'll wager the first thing you do mornings is to roll a