One Hundred Years of Solitude

mouth. Two days later
someone gave an orderly a
mug of black coffee and the
orderly passed it on to
someone else and that one to
someone else until, hand to
hand, it reached Colonel
Aureliano Buendía office. He
had not asked for any coffee,
but since it was there the
colonel drank it. It had a dose
of nux vomica strong enough
to kill a horse. When they
took him home he was stiff