John Barleycorn | Page 3

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JOHN BARLEYCORN by Jack London (1876-1916) 1913
CHAPTER I
It all came to me one election day. It was on a warm California
afternoon, and I had ridden down into the Valley of the Moon from the
ranch to the little village to vote Yes and No to a host of proposed
amendments to the Constitution of the State of California. Because of
the warmth of the day I had had several drinks before casting my ballot,
and divers drinks after casting it. Then I had ridden up through the
vine-clad hills and rolling pastures of the ranch, and arrived at the
farm-house in time for another drink and supper.
"How did you vote on the suffrage amendment?" Charmian asked.
"I voted for it."
She uttered an exclamation of surprise. For, be it known, in my
younger days, despite my ardent democracy, I had been opposed to
woman suffrage. In my later and more tolerant years I had been
unenthusiastic in my acceptance of it as an inevitable social
phenomenon.
"Now just why did you vote for it?" Charmian asked.
I answered. I answered at length. I answered indignantly. The more I
answered, the more indignant I became. (No; I was not drunk. The
horse I had ridden was well named "The Outlaw." I'd like to see any
drunken man ride her.)
And yet--how shall I say?--I was lighted up, I was feeling "good," I was
pleasantly jingled.
"When the women get the ballot, they will vote for prohibition," I said.

"It is the wives, and sisters, and mothers, and they only, who will drive
the nails into the coffin of John Barleycorn----"
"But I thought you were a friend to John Barleycorn," Charmian
interpolated.
"I am. I was. I am not. I never am. I am never less his friend than when
he is with me and when I seem most his friend. He is the king of liars.
He is the frankest truthsayer. He is the august companion with whom
one walks with the gods. He is also in league with the Noseless One.
His way leads to truth naked, and to death. He gives clear vision, and
muddy dreams. He is the enemy of life, and the teacher of wisdom
beyond life's wisdom. He is a red-handed killer, and he slays youth."
And Charmian looked at me, and I knew she wondered where I had got
it.
I continued to talk. As I say, I was lighted up. In my brain every
thought was at home. Every thought, in its little cell, crouched
ready-dressed at the door, like prisoners at midnight a jail-break. And
every thought was a vision, bright-imaged, sharp- cut, unmistakable.
My brain was illuminated by the clear, white light of alcohol. John
Barleycorn was on a truth-telling rampage, giving away the choicest
secrets on himself. And I was his spokesman. There moved the
multitudes of memories of my past life, all orderly arranged like
soldiers in some vast review. It was mine to pick and choose. I was a
lord of thought, the master of my vocabulary and of the totality of my
experience, unerringly capable of selecting my data and building my
exposition. For so John Barleycorn tricks and lures, setting the maggots
of intelligence gnawing, whispering his fatal intuitions of truth, flinging
purple passages into the monotony of one's days.
I outlined my life to Charmian, and expounded the make-up of my
constitution. I was no hereditary alcoholic. I had been born with no
organic, chemical predisposition toward alcohol. In this matter I was
normal in my generation. Alcohol was an acquired taste. It had been
painfully acquired. Alcohol had been a dreadfully repugnant
thing--more nauseous than any physic. Even now I did not like the taste

of it. I drank it only for its "kick." And from the age of five to that of
twenty-five I had not learned to care for its kick. Twenty years of
unwilling apprenticeship had been required to make my system
rebelliously tolerant of alcohol, to make me, in the heart and the deeps
of me, desirous of alcohol.
I sketched my first contacts with alcohol, told of my first intoxications
and revulsions, and pointed out always the one thing that in the end had
won me over--namely, the accessibility of alcohol. Not only had it
always been accessible, but every interest of my developing life had
drawn me to it. A newsboy on the streets, a sailor, a miner, a wanderer
in far lands, always where men came