Cocktail Talk: Tales of Whisky and Smuggling
Tales of Whisky and Smuggling is a fun read, full of stories that take a variety of paths, but at heart are all about the struggle between what we might call the revenue men, though in the book they’re usually referred to as gaugers or excisemen, versus the smugglers, the home-distillers operating outside the tax scheme much as their foreparents did, making their Uisge Beatha (water of life, or whisky). Neat, right! Even neater though, is when reading one of the stories I learned of the deoch-an-dorus, or a drink-at-the-door you give a guest as they leave. That’s a great tradition. I am in to that! Check out the below quote to see it in action.
‘Ach,well, you’ll just have a deoch-an-dorus before you go, I insist,’ their host said. Although feeling vaguely disappointed Holton and Muir were delighted to have this traditional Gaelic drink-at-the-door. James fetched glassed and poured them a hearty measure each and a smaller one for himself. The gaugers tossed off their drinks and said goodbye to their very convivial host, who was delighted to see how unsteady they were on their feet as they set off down the road.
–Stuart McHardy, Tales of Whisky and Smuggling
