"Up at Dartmouth the college runs a beer hall just like a PX where you can go and tear yourself down after you've been building yourself up on the snowy slopes," mumbled Vag to his drinking companion. "But on second thought this isn't so bad." He made a significant gesture towards the glassed-in counter which housed slices of Swiss cheese, salami, bologna, knackwurst, brockwurst, blood pudding and other samples of the Wursthaus larder.

"This bock stuff is pretty good," interjected his friend, wiping the foam from his lips.

The Springy night-breeze, wafted in from Boylston Street, blew over the open pickle jar beside the cash register and made Vag's nostrils dilate voluptuously with the smell of dill. "Ah, Bock," he smiled ecstatically, unaffected by his friend's matter-of-fact terseness. "Harbinger of Spring. Once a year the brewers clean out the dregs from their barrels and market this heady, brown nectar. Why, it's better than Jake Wirth's dark, and you can save the subway trip." He held his glass up and examined its rich molasses-like color in the light. The strains of Stravinsky's Sacre du Printemps revamped by Freddie Martin began to permeate the vernal atmosphere.

"Too bad it couldn't have been something of Bach's," he hazarded. "But at least it's got the right season."

The breeze was blowing in a little stronger now, damp from the water under the Anderson Bridge. "Time for birds on the wing and crew men on the slides," he remembered. And gesturing to the waitress for two more bottles and a couple of hot pastromis, he made a mental note to get his seersuckers out of the moth balls before the end of the week.