Stoning

“ If fortune frowns he may lessen his crop but never his attachment for the plant. Amid all the cares and perplexities incident to life, he puffs away and as the ashes drop from his cigar meditates upon the probable future of tobacco growers and all users of the weed. ”

“ The planter is never more indifferent to the ills of life and in sympathy with good feeling and pleasure, than when he sits down after dinner in his vine-thatched portico and lights his pipe, passing to his guests pipes, cigars, and tobacco in various forms, leaving them to choose their favorite mode of using it. Sambo is never more contented than when he burns the weed in a cob pipe, and draws the delicious smoke through an elder sprig or mullen stem. But the maid is happiest of all when with her lover she sits face to face, and they 'dip' together from the same magic plant—tobacco. ”

“ The mound-builders were well aware of the narcotic properties of tobacco, a plant which indigenous to America, and which since the discovery of the western continent has been domesticated in every region of the earth where the soil and climate are favorable to its cultivation. No habit at this day, it may be said, is more universal or more difficult to eradicate than that of smoking. ”

“ How dearly the late Poet Laureate, Tennyson, treasured his briar-root; how with his ‘silent friend’ he would seek seclusion, drawing unfailing solace from an inexhaustible tobacco jar, belongs to the social history of our times. In the fulness of their hearts, lovers of the weed have declared that in it they have found ‘the only thing in life that fumes without fretting.’ If to this excellence be added the further one of assuaging the fretful, we shall have the whole philosophy of smoking in a nutshell. ”

“ Tidings of the pleasing delusion of tobacco’s wonderful curative properties reached these shores towards the close of the sixteenth century, when the pipe was already installed in almost every chimney-nook. Needless to say that lovers of the weed received the intelligence with warmth, and held to the new belief with a steadfastness nothing could shake. ”

“ A pipe with genial warmth shall glow,
To which he turns in direst need,
To seek in smoke surcease of woe,—
A slave is each man to the weed.
[pg 55]
ENVOI.
Smokers, who doubt or con or pro,
And ye who dare to drink, take heed!
And see in smoke a friendly foe,—
A slave is each man to the weed.
BRANDER MATTHEWS.
HE RESPONDETH. SHE.
You still persist in using,
I observe with great regret,
The needlessly expensive
Cigarette.
HE.
You should set a good example ”

“ Certainly I put out the pipe—what could I do otherwise? But I thought that what the demoiselle Meelair has said was very strange, and not true—exactly; for I have often seen the tobacco grow, and it springs up out of the ground like the wheat or the beans, and it has beautiful leaves, broad and green, with sometimes a red flower at the top. Does the good God cause the filthy weeds to grow like that? ”

“ As the sun poured down with scorching severity, and two hours would elapse before we could venture to return to our work without fear of being sun struck, we lighted our pipes, and stretched our forms beneath the shade of a gum tree, leisurely watched the smoke of the fragrant tobacco as it curled over our heads. ”

“ These people, perfect wild beasts, double up the hand, curving the palm, and thus form a species of pipe; a green leaf protects the hand; within this the weed is placed, and thus they smoke. This is certainly the youth of smoking. ”

“ These are mostly old, well-seasoned smokers, to whose existence the weed has become essential; who smoke their own old pipes, which lack artistic coloring, in the intervals when they lay aside the pipes they are employed to color. Another and much smaller section of the class are those who smoke for smoking's sake, and yet are weak enough to nurse some special pipes for show. ”

“ They load their huge pipes with the dried leaves of this plant, and when lighted, they breathe the dark cloud of smoke from their mouth and nostrils, and as it curls around their head, ascending towards heaven, they present it as an offering to appease the anger of the Great Spirit. ”

“ Other plants are taken in the pipe, but they want quickness and hold not fire, only prick and draw........by their fulgio, which all smoke will do;and probably other herbs might be made quick and fire well, if prepared the same way, that is by fermentation, for in that alteration the body is opened, the fixed parts attenuated by the spirit, the oily parts diffused and the salt raised from the earthly bed wherein it naturally lieth obscure and heavy. ”

“ Now and then the curious and hungry approach to note with what skill or speed the cookery is progressing, but they are content to look on at a respectful distance and to make suggestions and criticisms, but not to interfere with aid. The epicurean smoker, who holds that the finest flavor of tobacco is evoked only by coal or blazing splinter, steals down upon the windward side and snatches a reluctant ember or an elusive flame that flickers out on the brink of the pipe bowl, but most who burn the weed are content now to kindle it with the less fervid flame of a match. ”

“ After the tobacco is cut, they weed and clean the ground on which it grew: each root then puts out several suckers, which are all pulled off, and only one of the best is left to grow, of which the same care is taken as of the first crop. ”

“ A pipe of tobacco, or a cigar, after a day's hard exercise, whether mental or bodily, and after the cravings of hunger and thirst are appeased, may be fairly ranked amongst the most delightful and most harmless of all earthly luxuries. It fills the mind with pleasing visions, and the heart with kindly feelings. A hard-working laborer, smoking by the side of his hearth at night, presents a perfect picture of quiet enjoyment. ”

“ They have pined more for the lulling effects of that nauseous weed than for ardent spirits; and it has been known that men will mutiny sooner when deprived of their tobacco, than when deprived of their usual food and rum. ”

“ Even in the poorest man’s house the tobacco tray, with its fire-pot and ash-pot, is an essential part of the [131] furniture. Visit the humblest abode and there will be placed before you all the tiny equipment for a smoke; but their weed is almost tasteless; certainly, it can do nobody any harm. Formerly the tiny cup of tea was always the prelude to social gossip; now, however, for some reason or other the pipe takes precedence of the cup. ”

“ The air of the room is thick with smoke, for most of the men are smoking clay or corncob pipes, but the smoke is scarcely recognizable as that of tobacco, so largely is that expensive weed mixed with dried sweet-fern and other herbs, for the sake of economy. ”

“ Add to all these considerations the well attested fact, that no sensible man, who has himself used the baneful weed, ever advised his neighbor or child to follow his example, but often the contrary; and its inutility is sufficiently proved. ”

“ I purchased at once, from a firm of wholesale chemists, a large quantity of a particular salt which I knew, from my experiments, to be the last ingredient required; and late one accursed night, I compounded the elements, watched them boil and smoke together in the glass, and when the ebullition had subsided, with a strong glow of courage, drank off the potion.
The most racking pangs succeeded: a grinding in the bones, deadly nausea, and a horror of the spirit that cannot be exceeded at the hour of birth or death. ”

“ You will see another with a good pipe, laden with good tobacco, well lit, blowing incessantly down the mouth-piece and the stem until the moisture introduced with his breath into the bowl of his pipe effectually prevents the tobacco from burning, and puts out the fire ”

“ In another cottage we find that a patient suffering from elf-shot is to be smoked with the fumes of herbs. A huge [Pg 26] quern stone which has been in the fire on the hearth all day is dragged out, the prepared herbs—wallwort and mugwort—are scattered upon it and also underneath, then cold water is poured on and the patient is reeked with the steam “as hot as he can endure it.” [24] Smoking sick folk, especially for demoniac possession, is a world-wide practice and of very ancient origin. ”

“ The variety of tobacco planted depends upon soil, climate, and market demands. The different types of tobacco are grown upon a wide range of soils differing mainly in their physical characters. Wet soils composed largely of clay produce large heavy plants that cure to a dark brown or red. Light sandy soils produce plants having a light thin leaf curing to a bright red, mahogany, or fine yellow. The influence of soil, climate, and manures on the quality of the produce is almost beyond what is known in any other cultivated plant. ”

“ Tobacco, unlike any other plant, readily adapts itself to soil and climate. The effect produced upon the plant may be seen in comparing the tobacco of Holland and France, the one raised upon low, damp ground, the other on a sandy loam. The early growers of the plant in Virginia, were very particular in the selection of soil for the plant. The lands which they found best adapted were the light red, or chocolate-colored mountain lands, the light black mountain soil in the coves of the mountains, and the richest low grounds. ”

“ From the case or bale in which the tobacco arrives, it passes into the hands of the person whose duty it is to soften it—a process which requires great skill and care; for the leaf is generally dry and brittle, and has to be shaken and well separated before the softening can be properly effected. ”

“ In the tobacco-growing districts of the United States the entire plant is cut down in the field close to the ground, then the stalks are spitted on long rods or laths, care being taken to keep the leaves from touching each other, and on these rods they are carried and hung in the barn or curing-house for drying.
Curing.The curing of the leaves which follows has for its objects the drying and preservation of the tobacco, and, by a process of slow fermentation, the modification of certain of the leaf constituents, and the development of the characteristic aroma of the substance. ”

“ The American silver weed [20] or tobacco, is an excellent defence against bad air, being smoked [Pg 88] in a pipe, either by itself or with nutmeg shred, and rew seeds mixed with it; especially if it be nosed, for it cleanseth the air and choaketh and suppresseth and disperseth any venemous vapour; it hath both singular and contrary effects; it is good to warm one being cold, and will cool one being hot. All ages, all sexes and constitutions, young and old, men and women, the sanguine, the choleric, the melancholy, the phlegmatic, take it without any manifest inconvenience ”

“ Tobacco has been a blessing to us idlers. What the civil-service clerk before Sir Walter’s time found to occupy their minds with it is hard to imagine. I attribute the quarrelsome nature of the Middle Ages young men entirely to the want of the soothing weed. ”

“ Many tribes of Indians use herbs of various kinds to mix with tobacco to reduce its strength, as they are in the habit of exhaling the smoke from the nostrils, and not from the mouth. By the adoption of this means a much smaller quantity of tobacco suffices to produce the soothing influence on the nervous system so well known to votaries of the weed. ”

“ Smoking is an old and venerable institution in this kingdom of ours, and dates far back beyond the introduction of tobacco to our shores. Long before Sir Walter Raleigh was thought of, there is reason to believe herbs and leaves of one kind or other—coltsfoot, yarrow, mouse-lax, sword-grass, dandelion, and other plants, and even dried cow-dung—were smoked for one ailment or other, and in some instances for relaxation and pleasure, and thus, no doubt, became habitually used. ”

“ We had no salt, sugar, coffee, or tobacco, which, at a time when men are performing the severest labor that the human system is capable of enduring, was a great privation. In this destitute condition we found a substitute for tobacco in the bark of the red willow, which grows upon many of the mountain streams in that vicinity. ”

“ They take a leafe from the stalks of their great bastard corn (which we commonly called Turkie—wheat) together with one of these tobacco-leaves and fold them up together like a coffin of paper, such as grocers make to put spices in, or like a small organ-pipe. Then putting one end of the same coffin to the fire, and holding the other end in their mouths, they draw their breath to them. When the fire hath once taken at the pipe's end, they draw forth so much smoke that they have their mouth, nose, throat, and head full of it ”

“ The plants ripen very fast and emit an aromatic odor, increasing in strength as the plants ripen. For smoking it has but few superiors. After curing, it is baled and sent to Europe, where it is manufactured into smoking tobacco. The plants are well cultivated and watched against the ravages of birds, which seem to like the young and tender plants especially before they are transplanted. ”

“ Tobacco. Qualities. Odour, strong, narcotic, and fœtid; Taste, bitter, and extremely acrid; Colour, yellowish green, (its brown appearance is artificial, being produced by the action of sulphate of iron.) Chemical Composition. Mucilage, albumen, gluten, extractive, a bitter principle, an essential oil, nitrate of potass, which occasions its deflagration, muriate of potass, and a peculiar proximate principle upon which the properties of the plant are supposed to depend, and which has therefore been named Nicotin. ”

“ Parr, whose pre-eminence among smokers we all acknowledged. Thus early in life brought under the soothing influence of the weed by so profound a scholar, whose knowledge of Greek was the terror and admiration of young men, and feeling the natural desire of youth to imitate the great, I thought I could not in any better way fit myself for his society than by adopting his habit of smoking, and out of a long clay pipe like his. It was then I developed a taste for tobacco which from that time onward never left me. ”