From ‘Blood, Iron and Gold’ by Christian Wolmar:
Pauling [George Pauling] was one of the great characters of African railway development, a fat man who professed that the only way to resist the local disease was through cast consumption of food and, especially, alcohol. Famously, on one two-day trip along the Beira Railway with its manager Alfred Lawley and chief engineer, A.M. Moore, the three consumed 300 bottles of German beer. Breakfast for three, a few days later, consisted of 1,000 oysters washed down with a modest eight bottles of champagne.
This really makes me want to find two willing friends, get 300 bottles of beer and see if we would still be alive three days later. Or, say, that breakfast.
