SIGN LANGUAGE FOR DRINKS.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XVIII, Issue 1047, 31 March 1910, Page 22

SIGN LANGUAGE FOR DRINKS.

The American papers are telling some bright anecdotes about the prohibition State of Kansas. It seems that after all the much advertised legislation it is not yet necessary for thirsty souls to slake their parched tongues with ice-water. The sign has been brought to perfection, and a gesticulating stranger has to be careful lest a sympathetic porter should think he was wig-wagging for a drink. In the drug stores, too, the stranger must exercise caution. One visitor, whose ear tickled, rubbed it, and instantly had a highball in a sodawater glass set before him. Other recognised signals of distress are said to be as follows:—Two fingers up, a bottle of beer; left arm extended, whisky;finger in the ear, highball; pulling lobe of right ear, gin rickey; finger on tip of nose, Manhattan cocktail; shaking hands with yourself, champagne. The Kansas hotel-port-erg are said to have become embarrassingly astute at this new sign-lan-guage. An old Methodist preacher, who had a habit of clasping his fingers and twirling his thumbs, was supposed by the hotel-porter to be signalling a dry mouth. “ I’ll leave them in your room,” he whispered, and before the old patriarch could answer he had gone. The preacher had not been a minute in his room when in popped the porter with a couple of pints of beer and a demand for seventy-five cents as “conveyancing fees.” When the couple had arrived at a mutual understanding it would have been hard to say which was most disgusted.—“ Vanity Fair.”