Tobacco pipe

“ The tobacco pipes in use in that part of Australia are curious. One form consists of a hollow tube as thick as a man’s arm, stopped at the ends and having one hole near the bottom into which is introduced the stem of a pipe, and another hole near the top through which the smoke is imbibed. Their use of the pipe is rather singular. When a party desires to smoke, the chief man lights the pipe, places his mouth to the orifice, and continually inhales until the interior of the hollow stem is filled with smoke. ”

“ There is no reason to believe that these pipes are older than the 17th century. The introduction of the tobacco pipe into Europe is generally ascribed to Ralph Lane, first governor of Virginia, who in 1586 brought an Indian pipe to Sir Walter Raleigh, and taught that courtier how to use the implement. The pipe-makers of London became an incorporated body in 1619, and from England the other nations of Europe learned the art of making clay pipes.
The habit of smoking with pipes spread with incredible rapidity ”

“ While tobacco pipes are generally of moderate capacity, some German and Danish smokers use pipe bowls nine or ten inches long and wide in proportion, and there are pipes in Africa and Damascus that will hold nearly a pound. ”

“ The pipes resemble modern ones in shape, and often bear manufacturers' marks, which make it practicable to estimate their age. The oldest of them are supposed to have been made during the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Probably the oldest illustration of a tobacco-pipe in Great Britain is in a carving on a chimney in the keep of Cawdor Castle, where among the devices are a mermaid playing the harp, a monkey blowing a horn, a cat playing a fiddle, and a fox smoking a tobacco-pipe. ”

“ That's the cheapest and healthiest way to smoke a pipe. I don't have to buy any tobacco to keep it filled, and as long as I leave it over there on the andiron I don't get any of the smoke up my nose or down my throat. ”

“ The first kind of European pipes were walnut shells, a hole being bored in one side for the reception of the stem—a common straw. It is possible that we get from this early form of tobacco pipe the term "straw," as applied to modern long clays, if, indeed, they are not named like straw-berries, from the material which protects them from injury.
CARVED WOOD PIPE, 61⁄2 INCHES HIGH. TOBACCO PLACED BEHIND HORSE'S HEAD.
The custom of using a pipe common to an assembled company was, no doubt, partly due to the circumstance that tobacco was at one time a most costly thing. ”

“ I remember with shame how formerly when I had taken two or three pipes I was presently ready for another, such a bewitching ‘thing’ it is, but I thank God he has now given me power over it; surely there are many who may be better employed than to lie sucking a stinking ‘tobacco pipe.’” She further said that the Indians for want of tobacco smoked hemlock and ground ivy. ”

“ To judge from the old pictures that have been preserved, the first Japanese pipes must have been as large as walking-sticks, whereas those now used give a man but three whiffs. After the third whiff, the wee pellet of ignited tobacco becomes a fiery ball, loose, and ready to leap from the pipe at a breath; and wherever it falls, it pierces holes like a red-hot shot. ”

“ The white earthen pipe, porous and permeable to liquids, is put first, because it is a good absorber of nicotine; the metallic pipe is put last, because it allows all the noxious products formed during the combustion of the tobacco to reach the mouth of the smoker. The meerschaum, which immediately follows the clay pipe, deserves its place only on condition that it is not too old. If it is seasoned, it is as bad as a wooden or porcelain pipe. The seasoning, of which poets have sung, may be full of charms for the amateur ”

“ A pipe, then, is a thing instrumental to our participation in the energy developed by tobacco in the state of positive existence. Now all will acknowledge that of pipes some are good, some bad, and some indifferent; let it be ours to inquire in what a pipe's excellence or goodness consists, and what kind of pipe is most likely to possess this excellence. Now a pipe that is excellent in all respects is a rare and precious thing, not to be acquired every day, and deserving of much attention when possessed. ”

“ There is a very singular kind of pipe which seems to be in use over a considerable portion of Southern Africa. The native of this country is never at a loss for a pipe, and if he does not happen to possess one of the pipes in ordinary use, he can make one in a few minutes, wherever he may be. For this purpose he needs no tools, and requires no wood, stone, or other material of which pipes are generally made. There is a certain grandeur about his notion of a pipe, for he converts the earth into that article, and the world itself becomes his tobacco pipe. ”

“ If we have raised any wonder in the breasts of our readers, we shall not diminish that wonder by some further explanations regarding this extraordinary pipe; if we have raised any incredulity, what we are now about to add will at once extinguish it.
The Queen's Tobacco-pipe, then, is a furnace built in the very centre of the great Tobacco Warehouse at the London Docks. This furnace is kept for the purpose of consuming all the damaged tobacco which comes into port. As the warehouse is the Queen's Warehouse, the furnace is really termed the Queen's Pipe ”

“ The "churchwarden" is a clay pipe with a slender stem, some 16 or 20 in. long. The most luxurious and elaborate form of pipe is the Persian kalyún, hookah or water tobacco pipe. This consists of three pieces, the head or bowl, the water bottle or base, and the snake or long flexible tube ending in the mouthpiece. The tobacco. which must be previously prepared by steeping in water, is placed in the head and lighted with live charcoal, a wooden stem passes from its bottom down into the water which ills the base, and the tube is fitted to a stem which ends in the bottle above the water. ”

“ Pipes.—In reference to these essentials to smoking tobacco, a great variety of tastes are displayed, while that of each country forms an amusing contrast to that of its neighbour. In the Eastern portion of the globe, the gorgeous hookah or superb chibouque with their serpent train are caressed: in France, the short twisted pipe: in Germany, the merschaum: in Holland, the long slender black pipe: in America, the short red clay pipe, or the ingeniously manufactured, yet murderous tomahawk, bears the tube of comfort; while in England—happy England—all, or any of these, are attainable. ”

“ The hemp pipe of India is a form of water pipe in which tobacco or a mixture of tobacco and hemp may be smoked. The Chinese and Japanese prefer a pipe with a very small bowl in which a pellet of finely shredded tobacco is smoked. The Koreans use a larger bowl with an extremely long stem. In Africa the water pipe is rudely made of a cow's horn perforated for stem and bowl holder. It is said that a Kafir lacking a pipe will often dig a small hole in the ground in which he puts tobacco, fit a stem in position below it, and, lying on his belly, enjoy a smoke. ”

“ I remember one incident which bears upon this part of the treatise. The gentleman who gave it to me had asked to see my tobacco-pipe; he examined it carefully, and when he came to the little protuberance at the bottom of the bowl he seemed much delighted, and exclaimed that it must be rudimentary. I asked him what he meant.
“Sir,” he answered, “this organ is identical with the rim at the bottom of a cup; it is but another form of the same function. Its purpose must have been to keep the heat of the pipe from marking the table upon which it rested. ”

“ The odour of an old clay pipe grown black with age hangs about it: it is acrid, burning narcotic, and scarcely less poisonous than prussic acid, a single drop having the power to kill a dog. It boils at a temperature of 482° Fahr., and rises into vapour at a point below that of burning tobacco, consequently it is always present in the smoke. ”

“ On these occasions the pipe is taken out of its covering by the Indian dignitary, ready charged with the "holy weed," when it is smoked by all the chiefs, each one taking only a single breath of smoke, which is regarded as implementing the treaty. The pipe is then rolled up in its robe of fur, and stowed away in the lodge of its keeper until it is again required. The war pipe is simply a tomahawk, with a perforated handle communicating with the bowl, which is opposite the sharp edge of the weapon. ”

“ In Germany, where the finest cnaster is but twenty-pence a pound, and excellent leaf-tobacco only five-pence, we have seen pipes that resembled actual furnaces compared with the general race of pipes, and have known a man smoke out half a pound of cnaster and drink a gallon of beer at a sitting. But this is perfectly pigmy work when compared with the royal pipe and consumptive tobacco power of Victoria of England. The queen's pipe is, beyond all controversy—for we have seen it—equal to any other thousand pipes that can be produced from the pipial stores of this smoking world. ”

“ The tobacco jar is another accessory of more recent date than tobacco pipes but interesting from the varieties of style and shapes. The finest are made of porcelain and are lavish in design and enrichment. Of all the articles of the smokers' paraphernalia none however exhibit more fanciful designs than Tobacco-stoppers used by smokers for crowding the tobacco into the pipe while smoking. ”

“ For the work-a-day and knock-about pipe the wooden pipe with short stem is without a rival. The qualities which are essential for a wooden pipe are many and it is difficult if not impossible to get any material that will answer all of them. The wood for such a pipe must be hard and practically incombustible, yet light. It must be sapless and inodorous so that when heated the fragrance of the tobacco would not be mingled with that of the wood and be lost. ”

“ Among the modern Apaches the medicine-man's diagnosis of a case is made by the pretended swallowing of a pipe filled with burning tobacco. It works out of his arm or leg, and if white the patient will recover; if colored, he is likely to die. Tubular pipes occur in many parts of the United States, and in California they are numerous. While they were designed primarily as smoking implements, they were no doubt often used, as here indicated, in the treatment of disease. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The form and make of the first pipe is a matter I do not propose to go into here; but in connexion with the first pipe smoked in this country Aubrey's interesting statements must be given. Writing in the time of Charles II, he said that he had heard his grandfather say that at first one pipe was handed from man to man round about the table. "They had first silver pipes; the ordinary sort made use of a walnut shell and a straw"—surely a very unsatisfactory pipe. Tobacco in those earliest days, he says, was sold for its weight in silver. ”

“ It represents an old man sitting on a fragment of statuary and smoking a long pipe against a picture of a landscape which stands upon an easel before him. Below, on his left, is a large jar labelled "Varnish." The figure of Time is nude and has large wings. Volumes of smoke are pouring against the surface of the picture from both his mouth and the bowl of his long clay pipe. In The Stage-Coach, or Country Inn-yard, is shown an old woman smoking a pipe in the "basket" of the coach. The plate of The Distrest Poet (1736) shows four books and three tobacco-pipes on a shelf. ”

“ These little tubes are smaller than the end of 28a pipe-stem, about four inches long, and made of very thin glass. A dozen can be procured for ten or twelve cents at any place where chemical supplies are to be found. A short tallow candle, held in a cheap tin candlestick, answers for the flame; and the tobacco-pipe, converted into the blowpipe just described, can be used in any of the experiments here given. ”

“ The pipe stem was of reed decorated with eagles’ quills or women’s hair. Native tobacco mixed with willow-bark or sumac leaves was smoked. The pipe was offered as a supreme proof of hospitality to distinguished strangers, and its refusal was regarded as a grievous affront. In the east and south-east, the bowl was of white stone, sometimes pierced with several stem holes so that many persons might smoke at once. ”

“ It is a sacred instrument, and its red color typifies the smoker’s flesh. The Western travelers mention offerings of tobacco to, and smoking of pipes in honor of, the Great Spirit. Some men will vow never to use the pipe in public, others to abstain on particular days. Some will not smoke with their moccasins on, others with steel about their persons; some are pledged to abstain inside, others outside the wigwam, and many scatter buffalo chip over their tobacco. ”

“ The cigar dealt the snuff-box its death-blow and the cigarette was chief mourner at its funeral.
As in other periods, men of letters and artists ignored the social prejudices and conventions about tobacco, and laughed at the artificial distinctions drawn between cigars and pipes. It is said that the late Sir John Millais smoked a clay pipe in his carriage when he was part of the first Jubilee procession of Queen Victoria—a performance, if it took place, which would certainly have horrified her tobacco-hating Majesty. ”