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THE
SEVEN SISTERS
POPULAR HISTORY OP THE SEVEN PREVAILING NARCOTICS OF THE WORLD.
DIRECTOR OP THE METROPOLITAN SCHOLASTIC MUSEUM.
“ 1 How many are you, then ? ’ said I.
' 0 Master, we are seven.’ ”
Wordsworth.
To ro-create lor man, whate’er Was lost in Paradise."
Southev's TnAEAni.
LONDON:
JAMES BLACKWOOD, PATERNOSTER ROW.
OF
BY
M. C. COOIE
[ The right of Translation is reserved .]
fcF /COo
jliHfdnrn.
TO ALL LOVERS OF TOBACCO, IN ALL PARTS OF THE WORLD, JUVENILE AND SENILE, MASCULINE AND FEMININE ;
AND TO ALL' ABSTAINERS,
VOLUNTARY AND INVOLUNTARY—
TO ALL OPIOPHA5I, AT HOME AND ABROAD, WHETHER EXPERIENCING THE PLEASURES, OR PAINS OF THE SEDUCTIVE DRUG—
TO ALL HASCHISCHANS, EAST AND WEST, IN WHATEVER FORM THEY CHOOSE TO WOO THE SPIRIT OF DREAMS—
TO ALL BUYEROS, MALAYAN OR CHINESE, WHETHER THEIR SIRI-BOXES ARE FULL, OR EMPTY—
TO ALL COQUEROS, WHITE OR SWARTHY, FROM THE BASE TO THE SUMMIT OF THE MIGHTY CORDILLERAS—
TO ALL VOTARIES OF STRAMONIUM AND HENBANE, HIGHLANDER, OR LOWLANDER—
AND
TO ALL SWALLOWERS OF AMANITA, EITHER IN SIBERIA OR ELSEWHERE—
THESE PAGES COME GREETING WITH THE BEST WISHES
OF THEIR OBEDIENT SERVANT,
J3ke ^fluikat
1
Wellcome Library for the History and Understanding of Medicine
PREFATORY PREMONITION.
“A certain miller was much annoyed by a goblin, who used to come and set his mill at work at night when there was no grain to be , ground, greatly to the danger of the machinery, so he desired a person to watch. This person, however, always fell asleep, but once woke up from a nap time enough to see the mill in full operation, a blazing fire, and the goblin himself, a huge hairy being, sitting by the side thereof. Pat s yer name ? ’ said the Highlander. Ourisk, said the unwelcome guest; c and what is yours ? ‘ Myself,’ was the reply ; ‘ her nain-
sell/ The goblin now went quietly to sleep, and the Highlander, taking a shovel of hot coals, hung them into the hairy lap of the goblin, who was instantly in a blaze. Out ran the monster to
VI
PREFATORY PREMONITION.
his companions, making as much noise as he could. ‘ Well,’ said they, ‘ who set you on fire ?’
< Myself,’ said the unlucky monster. c Well, then, you must put it out yourself,’ was the consoling rejoinder.”
Some of my readers may arrive at the con- clusion, that I, like the Ourisk, have trespassed upon other people’s property, and ground my corn at their milk Let it not be assumed, on my account, inasmuch as I do not myself make that assumption, that I have journeyed from Cornhill to Cathay, in search of those who habituate themselves to the indulgences herein set forth. Others have laboured, and I have eaten of the fruits of their labours. Travellers numberless have contributed to furnish my table, in some instances, without even thanks for their pains. This is the way of the world, and I am not a whit better than my neighbours. Let it, there- fore, be understood, that I make no pretensions to aught beyond the form in which these numerous contributions are now presented to the reader. The tedium of wading through volume after volume in search of information on these
PREFATORY PREMONITION.
VII
subjects has been performed for him, and com- pacted together into a pocket companion, saving, thereby, to him, a large amount of trouble, and a small amount of vexation. Private corre- spondence has furnished a portion of the infor- mation. Those who may recognise my own poaching pranks upon their domains may throw coals of fire upon my lap, and leave “Myself” to extinguish the flame.
Herein the reader will find only a popular history of the most important Narcotics indulged in, and the customs connected with that indulgence. Mere statistical details have as much as possible been avoided, and those calculated to interest the more matter-of-fact reader added in a tabulated form, as an appendix. The majority of these tables have been compiled from official documents, trade circulars, or commercial returns, and care has been taken to render them correct up to the period of their dates. In this department I am largely indebted to the valuable assistance of P. L. Simmonds, Esq., F.S.S., to whom I thus tender my thanks.
Those who are desirous of seeing specimens of
vm
PREFATORY PREMONITION.
the narcotics named, in the following pages, can visit either the Museum of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, the East India House Museum, the Food Department in the gallery of the South Kensington Museum, or the Industrial Museum in the gallery of the central transept of the Crystal Palace, in each of which they will meet with some of the articles named, though in none of them will they discover all. In the former two are illustra- tions of the opium manufacture, and at Kensington an interesting series of tobaccos, and other articles connected with the indulgence therein, and also with opium-smoking in China, together with some of the tobacco substitutes and sophistications. Hone of these collections are so complete as they might be. Public museums of this kind have every facility for doing more to instruct the public on the common things of every-day life : why they do not accomplish this, is as much a fault, perhaps, of the public as of themselves. There are hopes, however, to be entertained that one, at least, of these institutions will exhibit, in a complete and collected form, the principal narcotics and their
substitutes.
Why I should have chosen such a title for my
PREFATORY PREMONITION. ix
volume, and wherefore invested it with a legend, is matter of little importance. It was a fancy of my own, and if any think fit to quarrel with it, they may do so, without disturbing my peace of mind. The reply of the Ourisk to his companions, as to who set him on fire, was, “ Myself.”
Parents seldom baptize their children with a name pleasing to all their friends and relatives, yet the child manages to get through the world with it, and — dies at last.
M. C. C.
Lambeth.
CONTENTS.
Chapter I. — Somewhat Fabulous. page
The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus ; Legend of the Seven Sisters of Sleep ; Laureates of Sleep ; Necessity of Sleep ; Pleasures of Sleep ; Sanctity of Sleep ; The “ Last Sleep of Argyle Death of Sleeping Duncan; Desdemona and Othello ; Drowsiness, fatal alike to Devotion and Instruction 1
Chapter II. — The Sisters of Old.
Hemp amongst the Scythians ; Intoxicating vapours of the Massa- geta: ; the Nepenthes of Homer ; the Secret of Egyptian Thebes ;
The Poppy of the Ancients ; Secret Poisoning of Aratus of Sicyon ; The Acts of Locusta ; Death of Britannicus ; The Delphic Oracle; Arabian Nights; Another Nepenthes; Antony’s Retreat ; Retreat of the Ten Thousand ; Something unknown i n
Chapter III.— The “ Wond’rous Weed.”
Legendary origin of Tobacco ; Use in Hispaniola ; Names for Tobacco ; First Discovery by Europeans ; Introduction into France, Tuscany, Spain and Portugal, England ; Complaints against it ; Smoking taught to the Dutch ; Studenten Kneipe ; Tobacco in the East; Progress in England; Opposition by James I. and other monarchs in Russia, Italy, Persia, Turkey Tuscany, &c. ; Raleigh and Queen Elizabeth; Lovers of Tobacco ; The Distribution of the Tobacco Plant ; Consump- tion of Tobacco ; Curious use of the Flowers; Tobacco Poison ; Antidote to Arsenic ; Finance questions ; Religious prohibi- tions ; King J ames’a “ Counterblaste.”
Chapter IV. — The Cabinet of Cloudeand.
A Premier ; Lord Mayor Staines; Smoking the Plague; A First Cigar; Infant Smokers at Vizagapatam; Burtnah; Female Smokers in China; Smokers in Persia, Siam, Japan, Nicaragua on the Amazon, in New Guinea, Havana, Manilla ; The Linua of Johore; Signor Calistro’s Story; Cigars on the Orinoco ; In Chili ; The Court of Montezuma ; Panama Smoke- blowers; Rocky Mountain Indians; Salvation Yeo; Yemen Smokers ; Smoking in Austria ; Turkish Cloudland ; Defeat of . apoleon ; Curious Legend; Old Epigram; Cost of Puffing -
inTheCStateCU aUOnS ! Smoking in New York; Cigar-makiug
a 68 38
CONTENTS.
xii
Chapter Y. — I'ipeology. page
Philosophy in a pipe ; St. Omer pipes ; English pipes ; Curious Indian pipe ; Turkish howls ; Meerschaum ; Massa bowls ; Amber mouth-pieces; Origin of amber; Modern Egyptian pipes ; The Shibuk ; The Nargeeleh ; The Gozeh ; Egoodu of the Zulus; Hubble-bubble of the Delagoans; Kaffir bowls; Sailors’ pipes; Bamboo pipes; Winna of British Guiana; Shell pipes ; Chinese pipes ; Metallic pipes ; Ode to a Tobacco- pipe • Red pipe-stone quarry ; Stone pipes of Rocky Mountains ;
The “ Calumet ;” The Sultan’s pipe-bearer ; Wooden pipes; Modern pipeology ; Pipes in Australia • • •
Chapter VI. — Sniffing and Sneeshin.
The Eranciscan of Sterne; Etymology of Snuff; Pouncet-boxes ; The “ Niopo” of the Ottomacs ; The “ Curupa” of the Omaguas ; Snuffing in Iceland; Zulu Calabashes; Early Snuff-taking Apparatus; Origin of the “ Mull ;” Magnificent Mull; Mon- grabin Cases ; Strong Snuff of the Sahara ; Plugging and Ouidding; Snuff- taking Estimates; Snuff dipping; Death in the Box ; Adulterated Snuff ; Snuff Scents ; Substitutes for Snuff - Lead Poison; Advice Gratis; Gold Snuff-boxes ; Amber Snuff-boxes; Boxes of Hard-shelled Seeds; Chinese Flasks; Chinese Snuffing; A Snuff-stick; Birch-bark Boxes ; Sco ch Snuff-boxes; Introduction of Snuffing; Varieties of Snu « Hardham’s 37 ; Gossip on Sneezing ; Pseudo-philosophy of a Sneeze
73
Chapter VII.— -Quid pro Quo.
Eccentricities of Taste; Miles of Pig-tail; Tobacco Md Tea Calcu- lations- Chewing Ladies of Paraguay; Tchuktehi Chewers , Tobacco and Nation Quids; Taking the “ Bucca ;” Chewing Snuff- Quidding in Washington; Dignified Proceedings in the Senate House ; The Kou of the Hottentots; Angelica Root; Chewing Dulse ; A Quidding Monkey
Chapter VIII.— A Race of Pretenders.
Adulterated Tobacco ; Substitutes; Coltsfoot ; Milfoil ; Rhubarb; Bo<rbean- Sage; Mountain Tobacco; Cossena, Sumach, Bearberry ; Maize Husks; Pimento ; CasoariUa B^k ; Poly-
Jon™" wild ^gga-,culen; Purplnok ; Rope- smoking Chaplain ; FarewcU to Tobacco
Chapter IX.— “Mash Allah ’’—The Gift.
What is Opium? Indian Cultivation; The Nushtur; < Cutting the n , . Collecting the Juice; Use of the Refuse; Fo.t ,
Bofsa- Poppy Trash; Pussewali and Lewah ; Different Forms of Preparation ; Chandu ; Its Preparation in Singapore ; Sm aular Workman ; Adulterations ; Tye and Samshing ; Egyptian Conserves "Cordials Modes of taking Opium ; Immense Doses ; Opiumin’the « Fei Country;” The Crow and the Pigeon; ^ Estimate of Opium Consumption
CONTENTS.
Xlll
Chapter X. — The Gates of Paradise. tage
Paradise of the Moslems ; Siamese Opium-pipes ; Chinese Opium- pipe ; Smoking the Drug ; Its Effects ; An Old Malay ; Opium Experiences ; Dr. Madden’s Trial ; The Habit in China ; Dr. Medhurst’s Keport ; Victims at Slianghae ; Percentage of Smokers ; Amongst the Shikhs ; Influence on those engaged in its preparation ; Chinese petition ; Results in China ; Opium- eating poultry 132
Chapter XI. — Revels and Reveries.
Mahomet’s Ascent into Heaven ; Mental Effects of Opium ; An Opium-eater’s Reverie ; At the Opera ; Peeping into the Stores at Hong-Kong ; Opium-shops ; Papan Mera ; Stores in Singa- pore ; Opium in China ; Remarks of M. Abbd Hue 149
Chapter XII. — Pandemonium.
Running amol; in Java — in Singapore — in Batavia; Pains of opium ; Piranesi’s dream ; Confessions of crocodile visions ; Horrible dreams ; Fever phantasmagoria of “ Alton Locke A fable; Chinese opium- smoker ; Mustapha Shatoor; The Theriakis ; Heu Naetse’s opinion; Experiences of a surgeon at Penang ; Testimonies of Abbd Hue ; Ho King Shan ; Oppen- heim ; Dr. Madden ; Dr. Oxley; Dr. Little; Opium and In- surance ; Another side of the question 163
Chapter XIII. — Opium: Morals.
Examination of Criminals at Singapore ; Income and expenditure ; Opium-smoking and crime ; Examination of transports ; Drun- kenness compared with opium-smoking ; De Quincey’s com- parison ; Abuse of opium the source of poverty ; The diseased poor of Singapore ; Their consumption of opium ; Cooly smokers ; Difficulty of discarding the habit of opium-smoking • Opinion of Dr. Eatwell
Chapter XIV. — False Prophets.
Preparations of opium ; History of lettuce ; Lactucarium ; Narcotic effects of Lettuce ; Lacticiferous plants ; Dutchman’s laudanum; Syrian rue ; Sterculia seeds ; Beah leaves ; Adulterations • Imitation opium-balls
Chapter XV. — Nepenthes.
Influence of climate on plants ; Native home of hemp ; Properties of hemp-seed ; Distribution of hemp; Scythian hemp; Anti- quity of hemp ; Churrus, or hemp resin ; Homeca ; Gunjah ; Bang, or Guaza; Majoon ; Haschisch ; Dawamese ; Hasch- asheens and Assassins; Berch ; Dacha; Hemp in India — in Egypt > Use of Stimulants
Chapter XVI. — Gunja at Home.
At home;” Influence of hemp extract; Intoxication; Annihila- tion of time; Happiness; M. de Saulcey’s trial ; Extraordinary delusions ; History of Genii ; The Slieykli’s jinnee ; Mr. Lane’s cook and the efreet ; The captain’s sheep ; Mansour’s jinnee ; Experiments; The impromptu rajah ; The fosterer of supersti- tion amongst the Arabs 1
230
XIV
CONTENTS.
Chapter XVII.— Hobble-Bubble. page
Dakka smoking at Ambriz ; Busbmen smokers ; Curious method of the Bechuanas ; Egoodu of the Zulus ; Snuffing hemp ; Hubble- Bubble of the Delagoans; Haschishans of Constantine; Gunjah in India ; Predilection of “Young America” for Bang 250
Chapter XVIII. — Seri and Pinang.
The Malayan race ; Areca palm ; Qualities of nuts ; Produce of trees ; a mi n at production ; Preparation ; How used ; Local names; Chinese consumption; Cinghalese instruments; Con- firmed habits ; Estimates of consumption ; The palm in Sumatra; Substitutes in the Philippines— in Ceylon Poetical ^
votaries
Chapter XIX. — Under the Palms.
The betel peppers ; Their cultivation ; Chenai of Penang ; Poly- nesian ava ; Chewing cava at Tongataboo ; Pipula moola ; Cfambir preparation ; “ Kutt,” or cutch ; Story of an Indian “kutt” maker; Areca cutch; Statistics of the catechu and ^
gambir trade
Chapter XX. — Chewing the Coon.
In Burmali; The Manilla doctor; Yankee adventure; Teeth colouring properties ; Custom in Sumatra ; Betel-stand of the Sultan of Moco-moco ; Of the Sultan of Sooloo ; Betel a correc- tive of over-doses of opium ; Tagali maidens ; A Tagal wedding ; Making the buy os ; Mahomedan abstinence; Ofter to Lady
Baffles “
Chapter XXI.— Our Ladt of Yongas.
Coca under the Incas ; Origin of the name ; Early history; The coca shrub ; The harvest ; Estimated production ; Estimated consumption and consumers; Spanish protection ; Method ot using the coca; How to enjoy it; Stimulating effects; Coca tea-parties; Confirmed coqueros; The virtues of coca - The vices of coca; Power of allaying hunger; Questionable nutri- tive properties ; Devotion of Peruvians to it ; Narcotio rliodo- ^
dendrons *"
Chapter XXII.— Whitewash and Clay.
Lime-eating at Paria; Among the Guajiros ; White mud of the Kiver Mackenzie ; Edible clay of the Guanos and Ott omacs , O Banco • Caouac of Western Africa; Tanaampo and ampo of Sa;’ Edible stone of New Caledonia; Lime at » Lcche de llauka of Quito ; Kussiau stone
and bergbutter of Germany ; Bergmelil of Sweden , 1 ossil infusoria^- MM. Cloquet and Breschets experiments i Bucaro Sy of Portugal and Spain ; Bahaa of La Paz ; Chaco of ^ Cliiquisaca ; Bed earth of Sikkim ••
Chapter XXIII.— Precious Metals.
Wherein metals are precious; Cumulative action ‘
poisons ; Use of corrosive sublimate ; A”em°?“lCd °bac£0 of in Canada; Benefits claimed for it; Arsemated
China ; Effects of Arsenic ; Uses of Arsenic at home
CONTENTS.
XV
Chapter XXIV. — Datcra and Co. page
Solanaceous plants and their properties ; The thorn-apple of India ;
The Florispondio of Peru ; Its superstitious uses ; Indulgence therein in New Granada; Effects of thorn-apple on the Jamaica soldiers ; Origin of Belladonna ; Its effects as a poison ; Influence on the brain ; A family beneath the spell ; Henbane and its effects; Jealousy caused and cured ; Foxglove leaves 323
Chapter XXV. — The Exile of Siberia.
Kamtschatdale prospects ; Poisonous fungi ; The amanita-eater in Eussia ; Fatal effects of amanita ; Description ; Preparation of the fungus ; Method of indulging therein ; Effects produced ;
Its singular properties; “Sucking the monkey;” Narcotic symptoms of poisonous fungi ; Narcotism of puff-ball ........ 336
Chapter XXVI. — Odds and Ends.
Gathering the crumbs ; Smoke vision of life ; The Canadian herb Legend of St. Betsy ; Two Ottoman swains ; Story of Abou Gallioun ; Chinese designations ; Smoke doth follow the fairest ;
The broken pipe of Saladin ; Clerical authority ; The Angel of Sleep and the Angel of Death 346
Appendix.
Tables of chronology of tobacco ; Of consumption of tobacco ; Duties on importation of tobacco ; Profits of the French Kegie ; Consumption of tobacco in Britain ; Consumption of tobacco in the Austrian Empire ; Exports from the United States in 1855 ; Disposition of the growth of the United States in 1840 and 1850 ; Exports from America in decennial periods ; Analysis of tobacco ; Ketum of opium exports ; Income of East India Com- pany from opium monopoly ; Opium statistics of Great Britain ; Analysis of opium ; Prisoners sentenced to the House of Cor- rection, and their opium habits ; Opium consumed in the Singapore Hospital ; Keports of opium smoking in China ; Professor Johnston’s estimates ; Synopsis of narcotics with their substitutes 357
THE SEVEN SISTEES OF SLEEP.
CHAPTER I.
SOMEWHAT FABULOUS.
“ Oh sleep ! it is a gentle thing.
Beloved from pole to pole.” — Coleridge.
During the Decian persecution, seven inhabitants of Ephesus retired to a cave, six were persons of some consequence, the seventh was their servant ; from hence they despatched the attendant occa- sionally to purchase food for them. Decius, who like most tyrants possessed long ears, hearing of this, ordered the mouth of the cave to he stopped up while the fugitives were sleeping. After a lapse of some hundred years, a part of the masonry at the mouth of the cave falling, the light flowing in awakened them. Thinking, as Rip Van Winkle also thought, that they had enjoyed a good night’s rest, they despatched their servant to buy provi- sions. All appeared to him strange in Ephesus- and a whimsical dialogue took place, the citizens accusing him of having found hidden treasure he persisting that he offered the current coin of the realm. At, length, the attention of the emperor was excited, and he went, in company with the bishop, to visit them. They related their story and shortly after expired.
Thus much chroniclers narrate of the seven sleepers of Ephesus. All are not agreed as to the place where this extraordinary event occurred. It
2 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
has been assigned also to the “ mountain of the seven sleepers,” near Tersous. It may have been claimed by the citizens of twenty other ancient cities, for aught we can tell: Faith removes
mountains. But the number remains intact. Mahomet wrote of seven heavens — no Mahometan takes the trouble to believe in less. The “wise men were but seven there were seven poets of the age of Theocritus ; seven of the daughters of Pleione elevated to the back of Taurus ; and
“ There were seven pillars of gothic mould,
In Chillon’s dungeon, dark and old j”
and wherefore not seven sleepers at Ephesus or Tersous ; or seven sisters of
« Nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep 1”
Although not to be found in Livy, or Hesiod or Ovid or any of the fathers ot history 01 fable, there is a legend of the latter seven, which may be considered in the light of an abstract of title ot certain seven sisters, to be included in the list o immortal sevens who have honoured the earth by
making it their abode. .
It is’ many thousands of years since bleep received from her parent, as a dowry of love, an empire, unequalled in extent by any other which the1 earth ever acknowledged. Her domain em- braced “ the round world, and they that dwell therein.” From pole to pole, and from ocean to ocean, she swayed her sceptre. And it was assigned her that man should devote one-tlnrd of his existence in paying homage at the foot of 1 e throne. All monarchs from Ninue 1 to ^apoteon have done her honour. All ladies from Rhodope to Cleopatra, and from Helen to Clotlnldc, have admitted her claim to ascendency. And all serfs.
SOMEWHAT FABULOUS. 3
and all captives, from Epictetus to Abd-el-Kader, have forgotten their bonds and their captivity, and bowed, on an equality with kings, beneath her nod.
Sleep had seven sisters. Envious of her throne and jealous of her power, they complained bitterly that no heritage, and no government, and no homage was theirs. Then they strove to deceive men, and counterfeit the blessings which Sleep conferred, and thus to steal the affections of her subjects from the universal monarch, and transfer them to themselves. Herein they toiled and in- vented many strange devices; and though they beguiled many, these all fell back again to the allegiance they had sworn of old.
‘‘ 0 my sisters !” said Sleep, “wherefore do you stiive to instil discontent into the hearts of my subjects and breed discord in my dominions ? Know ye not, that all mortals must fain obey me, or die ? Your enchantments cannot diminish my votaries, and only serve to increase my power. And men, who for a while are cheated of the blessings I confei, woo me at last with increased ardour and with songs of gratitude fall at my feet/’ ’ Morphina first replied—
. “ We know full well, proud sister, how wide is your empire, and how great your power, ’but we too must reign, and our kingdoms will soon coim- pare with yours. Let us but share with you in ruling the world, or we will rule it for ourselves.” ‘Sisters! let us be at peace with each other Is there not two-thirds of the life of man free from my control ? Why should you not steal from iron- handed care enough of power to make you queens as potent, or little less than me ? My minister of dreams shall aid you by his skill, and visions more gorgeous, and illusions more splendid, than ever visited a mortal beneath my sway, shall attend the ecstacies ot your subjects.”
B 2
4
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP]
The sisters were reconciled henceforth. And anon thousands and millions of Tartar tribes and Mongolian hordes welcomed Morphina, and blessed her for her soothing charms and benignant rule — blessed her for her theft from the hours of sorrow and care — blessed her for the marvels of dreams the most extravagant, and visions the most gor- geous that ever arose in the brain of dweller in the glowing East.
More extended became the sway of the golden- haired Virginia, until four-fifths of the race of mortals burned incense upon her altars, or silently proffered thank-offerings from their hearts. Curl- ing ever upwards from the hearth of the Bi iton and the forest of the Brazilian— from the palaces of Ispahan and the wigwams of the Missouri — from the slopes of the eternal hills and the bosom of the mighty deep, arose the fragrant odours of her votaries, mingled with the hum of pasans in
her praise. .
Beneath the shadow of palms, in the sultry regions of the sun, the dark impetuous Gunja held her court. There did the sons of the Ganges and the Nile, the Indus and the Niger, own her sovereignty 5 and there did the swarthy Hindoo and the ebon African hold festivals in her honour. And, though the hardy Norseman
scorned her proffered offices, she established her throne in millions of ardent and affectionate
llCNot far away, the red-lipped Siraboa raised her graceful standard from the summit of a feathery palm ; and the islanders of the Archipelago m proa and canoe, hastened to do her homage, ihe murderous Malay stayed his uplifted weapon, to bless her name ; and savage races, that ne er bowed
before, fell prostrate at her feet. .
Honoured by the Incas, and flattered bj priests
SOMEWHAT FABULOUS.
5
persecuted by Spanish conquerors, but victorious, Erythroxylina established herself in the Bolivian Andes and the Cordilleras of Peru. With subjects the most devoted and faithful, she has for ages received the homage of a kingdom of enthusiastic devotees.
Two,. less favoured, less beautiful, and less successful of the sisters, pouting and repining at the good fortune that had attended the others, secluded themselves from the rest of the world, and rushed into voluntary exile. Datura, ruddy as Bellona, fled to the Northern Andes ; and in those mountainous solitudes collected a devoted few of frantic followers, and established a miniature court. The pale and dwarfish Amanita, turning her back on sunny lands and glowing skies, sought and found a home and a refuge, a kingdom and a court, in the frozen wastes of Siberia.
And. now . in peace the sisters reign, and the world is divided between them. When care, or woe, or wan disease, steals for a time the mortal from his allegiance to the calm and blue-eyed Sleep, then do the sisters ply their magic arts to win him back again, and, by their soothing in- fluence, lull him to rest once more, and again unlock the portals of the palace of dreams ; then issues from the trembling lips the half-heard murmur of a whispered blessing on the
In all times Sleep has been a fertile theme with poets one on which the best and worst has been
SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.*
•vrraius uae -laates ol the creation:” especially
and in this matter
"We have a vision of our own. And why should we undo it ?”
6
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
written. All forms in heaven and in earth have sub- mitted themselves to become similes ; and columns of adjectives have done duty in the service since Edmund Spenser raised his House of Sleep, where
“ careless Quiet lyes,
Wrapt in eternal silence, farre from enimyes.”
No monarch has numbered so many odes in his praise, or had so many poet laureates “all for love.” These, though not so long, are quite as worthy as the one we heard when George III. was no longer king. Perhaps that same little tyrant, Love, has come in for even a larger share of what some would call “twaddle.” In the sunny mom of youth, these hung upon our lips, and dwelt in our hearts, with less of doubt than disturbs their present repose. Old age makes us sleepy, and we sing —
“ O magic sleep ! 0 comfortable bird,
That broodest o’er the troubled sea of the mind Till it is hushed and smooth ! 0 unconfined
Restraint, imprisoned liberty, great key To golden palaces, strange minstrelsy,
Fountains grotesque, new trees, bespangled caves,
Echoing grottoes, full of tumbling waves And moonlight ; aye, to all the mazy world Of silvery enchantments !” — Endymion.
“ God gave sleep to the bad,” said Sadi, ‘ in order that the good might be undisturbed.” Yet to good and bad sleep is alike necessary. During the hours of wakefulness the active brain exerts its powers without cessation or rest, and during sleep the expenditure of power is balanced again by repose. The physical energies are exhausted by labour, as by wakefulness are those of the mind ; and if ’sleep comes not to reinvigorate the mental powers, the overtaxed brain gives way, and lapses into melancholy and madness. Men depnv ed of rest, as a sentence of death, have gone, trom tho world raving maniacs ; and violent emotions of tho
SOMEWHAT FABULOUS.
7
mind, without repose, have so acted upon the body, that, as in the case of Marie Antoinette, Ludovico Sforza, and others, their hair has grown white in a single night- —
“ As men’s have grown from sudden fears. ” *
Mind and body alike suffer from the want of sleep, the spirit is broken, and the fire of the ardent imagination quenched. Who can wonder that when disease or pain has racked and tortured the frame, and prevented a subsidence into a state so natural and necessary to man, he should have re- sorted to the aid of drugs and potions, whereby to lull his pains, and dispel the care which has banished repose, and woo back again —
“ the certain knot of. peace,
The baiting place of wit, the balm of woe ; . 1
The poor man’s wealth, the prisoner’s release,
Tk’ indifferent judge between the high and low.”
* A correspondent of the Medical Times having asked for authentic instances of the hair becoming grey within the space of one night, Mr. D. F. Parry, Staff-Surgeon at Aldershott, transmitted the following account, of which he made memor- andum shortly after its occurrence. “ On February 19, 1858, the column under General Franks, in the south of Oude, was engaged with a rebel force at the village of Chainda, and several prisoners were taken . One of them, a sepoy of the Bengal army, was brought before the authorities for examination, and I, being present, had an opportunity of watching from the com- mencement the fact I am about to record. Divested of his uniform, and stripped completely naked, he was surrounded by the soldiers, and then first apparently became alive to the danger of his position ; he trembled violently, intense horror and despair were depicted in his countenance, and although he answered all the questions addressed to him, he seemed almost stupified with fear ; while actually under observation, within the space of half-an-hour, his hair became grey on every por- tion of his head, it having been, when first seen by me, the glossy jet black of the Bengalee, aged about twenty-four. The attention of the bystanders was first attracted by the serieant whose prisoner he was, exclaiming, ‘ He is turning grey •’ and 7 , several other persons, watched its progress. Gradually but decidedly, the change went on, and a uniform greyish colour was completed within the period above named.”
8
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
Leigli Hunt has well said, “ It is a delicious moment that of being well nestled in bed, and feel- ing that you shall drop gently to sleep. The good is to come, not past ; the limbs have just been tired enough to render this remaining in one posture delightful ; the labour of the day is gone — a gentle failure of the perceptions creeps over you — the spirit of consciousness disengages itself once more, and with slow and hushing degrees, like a mother detaching her hand from that of a sleepiug child, the mind seems to have a balmy lid closing oyer it, like the eye — it is closed — the mysterious spirit has gone to take its airy rounds.”
It is this .universal sense of the blessing of sleep which takes hold of the mind with such a religious feeling, that the appearance of a sleeping form, whether of childhood or age, checks our step, and causes us to breathe softly lest we disturb their repose. We can scarce forbear whispering, while standing before the well-known picture of the “ Last Sleep of Argyle,” lest by louder or more dis- tinct articulation, we should rob the poor old man of a moment of that absence of sorrow which sleep has brought to him for the last time.
Shakespeare has made the murder of Duncan to seem the more revolting in that it was committed while he slept. Macbeth himself must have felt this while exclaiming —
“ Methongbt I heard a voice cry, 1 Sleep no more .
Macbeth does murthcr sleep, the innocent sleep ,
Sleep, that knits up the ravelled sleavc of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labours bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.’ ”
Had Desdemona been sent to her last account at once, when her lord entered the room and kisset her as she slept, we feel that all our pity for the Valous Moor would have been turned to hate, and
SOMEWHAT FABULOUS.
9
our detestation of him been so great that no room bad been left for execration of the villanous Iago, who now seems to be the Mephistopheles, the evil genius, of the work.
“A blessing,” says Sancho Panza, “ on him who first invented sleep ; it wraps a man all round like a cloak.” But neither Sancho nor any one else will give us a blessing if we suffer ourselves to go to sleep in thinking over it, at the very threshold of our enterprise, and before indulging in communion with the seven sisters of whom we have spoken. It was a trite remark of a divine that “ where drowsiness begins, devotion ends,” and needs appli- cation as much to book writers as to sermon preachers. Although we may not have the power to check an occasional yawn, in which there may be as much temporal relief as in a good sneeze, let us avoid the premonitory sinking of the upper eyelids, by calling in the aid of Francesco Berni to release us from the spell of sleep, and introduce us to “the sisters” of the olden time.
“ Quella diceva cli’era la piu bella
Arte, il piu bel mestier che si facesse ;
II letto er’ una veste, una gonella Ad ognun buona che se la mettesse.”
OniiAND. Innamou, lib. iii. cant. vii.
CHAPTER II.
THE SISTERS OF OLD.
“ What are these,
So -withered, and so wild in their attire ;
That look not like the inhabitants o’ the earth.
And yet are on’t ?” — Macbeth.
There is no reason to doubt that the ancients were, in a manner, acquainted with some of the narcotics known to us, although they did not indulge in them as stimulants or luxuries. The antiquarian, it is true, has failed to unearth the tobacco-box of Claudius, or the pipe of Nero — however much the latter may have been given to smoke. And no one has as yet discovered a snuff- box bearing the initials of Marc Antony, whence the taper fingers of Egypt’s queen drew a pinch of Princess’ Mixture or Taddy’s Violet, gazing with loving eyes on Antony the while. In those remote times the hemp and the poppy were not unknown ; and there is reason for believing that in Egypt the former was used as a potion for soothing and dis- pelling care.
Herodotus informs us that the Scythians culti- vated hemp, and converted it into linen cloth, resembling that made from flax ; and he adds also, that “ when, therefore, the Scythians have taken some seed of this hemp, they creep under the cloths, and then put the seed on the red hot stones ; but this being put on smokes, and pro- duces such a steam, that no Grecian vapour-bath would surpass it. The Scythians, transported with
THE SISTERS OF OLD.
11
the vapour, shout aloud.” * The same author also states that the Massagetse, dwelling on an island of the Araxes, have discovered “ trees that produce fruit of a peculiar kind, which the inhabi- tants, when they meet together in companies, and have lit a fire, throw on the fire as they sit round in a circle ; and that by inhaling the fumes of the burning fruit that has been thrown on, they become intoxicated by the odour, just as the Greeks do by wine, and that the more fruit is thrown on, the more intoxicated they become, until they rise up to dance, and betake themselves to singing.” f Homer also makes Helen administer to Tele- machus, in the house of Menelaus, a potion pre- pared from nepenthes , which made him forget his sorrows.
“Meanwhile with genial joy to warm the soul,
Bright Helen mix’d a mirth-inspiring bowl ;
Temper’d with drugs of sovereign use to assuage The boiling bosom of tumultuous rage ;
To clear the cloudy front of wrinkled care,
And dry the tearful sluices of despair ;
Charm’d with that virtuous draught, the exalted mind All sense of woe delivers to the wind :
Though on the blazing pile his parent lay,
Or a loved brother groan’d his life away,
Or darling son, oppress’d by ruffian force,
Pell breathless at its feet a mangled corse ;
From morn to eve, impassive and serene
The man entranced would view the deathful scene.
These drugs, so friendly to the joys of life,
Bright Helen learn’d from Thone’s imperial wife,
Who sway’d the sceptre where prolific Nile With various simples clothes the fatten’d soil.
With wholesome herbage mixed, the direful bane Of vegetable venom taints the plain ;
From Paeon sprung, their patron-god imparts lo all the Pharian race his healing arts.”
Pope’s Homer's Odyssey , b. iv.
* Herod., lib. iv. cap. 74-75. t lb., lib. i. cap. 202.
12
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
Diodorus Siculus states that the Egyptians laid much stress on the circumstance that the plant used by Helen had been given her by a woman of Egyptian Thebes, whence they argued that Homer must have lived amongst them, since the women of Thebes were celebrated for possessing a secret whereby they could dissipate anger or melancholy. This secret is supposed to have been a knowledge of the narcotic properties of hemp. The plant was known to the Romans, and largely used by them in the time of Pliny for the manufacture of cordage, and there is scarce a doubt that they were acquainted with its other properties. Galen refers to the intoxicating power of hemp, for he relates that in his time it was customary to give hemp-seed to the guests at banquets as a promoter of hilarity and enjoyment. Slow poisons and secret poisoning was an art with which the Romans were not at all unfamiliar. What the medium was through which they committed these criminal acts, can only be conjectured from the scanty informa- tion remaining. Hemp, or opium, or both, may have had some share in the work, since the poppy was sacred to Somnus, and known to possess narcotic properties.
The latter plant is one of the earliest described. Homer speaks of the poppy growing in gardens, and it was employed by Hippocrates, the father of physic, who even particularizes two kinds, the black and the white, and used the extract of opium so extensively, as to he condemned by his contemporary Diagoras. Dioscorides and Pliny also make mention of it ] and from their time, it lias been so commonly used, as to be incorporated in all the materia medicas of subsequent medical
^Plutarch tells us that a poison was administered to Aratus of Sicyon, not speedy and violent, but ol
THE SISTERS OF OLD.
13
that kind which at first occasions a slow heat in the body, with a slight cough, and then gradually brings on consumption and a weakness of intellect. One time when Aratus spat up blood, he said, “ This is the effect of royal friendship.” And Quintilian, in his Declamations, speaks of this poison in such a manner as proves that it must then have been well known.
The infamous acts of Locusta are noticed by Tacitus, Suetonius, and Juvenal. This poisoner seems to have been a type of such a character as the traditions of a later age embodied in the person and under the name of Lucretia Borgia.
Agrippina, being desirous of getting rid of Claudius, but not daring to despatch him sud- ■ anC^ ^ Ashing not to leave him time sufficient to make new regulations concerning the succession to the throne, made choice of a poison which should deprive him of his reason and gra- dually consume him. This she caused to be prepared by an expert poisoner, named Locusta who had been condemned to death for her infamous actions, but saved that she might be employed as a state engine. The poison was given to the em-
as, on account
of his irregular manner of living it did not produce the desired effect, it was assisted by some
iW fir°n?er nature* We are a]so further told tnat this Locusta prepared the drug wherewith
whomhi^n'i611 B‘itan,nicus' the son of Messalinu, father, Claudius, wished to succeed him
dvlnwhr°ne'i AS this poison occasioned only a ) entcry, and was too slow in its operation the
emperor compelled Locusta, by blows and bv
threatening her with death, to prepare in hL nre
sence one more powerful. It w!ns first tried on a
ud, but as the animal did not die till the end of
five hours, she boiled it a little longer unlit it
14
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
instantaneously killed a pig to which it had been given, and this poison despatched Britannicus as soon as he had tasted it. For this service the emperor pardoned Locusta, rewarded her liberally, and gave her pupils, whom she was to instruct in her art, in order that it might not be lost.
The pupils of Locusta have not left us, however, the secret which their mistress confided to them. The demand made of the apothecary in “ Romeo and Juliet” would have suited Nero’s case, in the latter instance.
“ Let me have
A dram of poison ; such soon speeding geer As will disperse itself through all the veins,
That the life-weary taker may fall dead ;
And that the trank may be discharged of breath
As violently, as hasty powder fired
Doth hurry from the fatal cannon’s mouth.”
What connection the narcotic hemp had with the famous oracle of Delphi is not altogether cer- tain, but it has been supposed, and such supposition contains nothing of heresy in these days, that the ravin ^s of the Pythia were the consequences ot a good dose of haschish, or bang. The non-classical readers will allow us to inform them, and the classical permit us to remind them, that the oracle at Delphi was the most celebrated in all Greece. That it was related of old, that a certain shepheid, tending his flocks on Mount Parnassus, observed, that the steam issuing from a hole m the rock seemed to inspire his goats, and cause them to frisk about in a marvellous manner, that this same shepherd was tempted to peep into the hole him- self and the fumes rising therefrom filled him with such ecstacy, that he gave vent to wild and extrava- gant expressions, which were regarded as prophe- tical. This circumstance becoming known, the place was revered, and thereon a temple was
THE SISTERS OF OLD.
15
afterwards erected to Apollo, and a priestess appointed to deliver the oracles. This priestess of Apollo, Pythia, was seated over the miraculous cavity upon a tripod, or three-legged stool, and the tumes arising were supposed to fill her with in- spiration, and she delivered, in bad verses, the oracles of the deity. During the inspiration, her eyes sparkled, her hair stood erect, and a shivering ran over the whole body. Under the convulsions thus produced, with loud howlings and cries, she delivered the messages, which were carefully noted down by an attendant priest. Plutarch states, tdat one of the priestesses was thrown into such an excessive fury, that not only those who came to consult the oracle, but the priests in attendance
WT.xS0,tfri5ed’ that they forsook her and fled’ and that the fit was so violent, that she continued several days m agony, and finally died. It has been believed that these fumes, instead of proceeding iiom the earth, were produced by the burning of some narcotic herb, probably hemp. Who shall decide ?
^ In later times <( bang” is referred to in the Arabian Nights. In one of the tales, two ladies la conversation, and one enquires of the other It the queen was not much in the wrong not to love so amiable a prince?” To which the ntW replied, “ Certainly, I know not why she goes out every night and leaves him alone. Is it possible that he does not perceive it ? ” “ Alas ! ” says the fiist, how would you have him to perceive it? fehe mixes every evening with his drink the juice o a certain herb, which makes him sleep so sound a night, that she has time to go where she pleases and as day begins to appear, she comes to him agam, and awakes him by the smell of somethin she puts under his nose.”
The Caliph Haroun al Easchid indulged too in bang/ and although somewhere we have seen
16
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
this word rendered “henbane,” we still adhere to the “ bang ” of the text, and think the evidence ia in favour of the Indian hemp. Further accounts of the early history of this plant we will not however forestal, as it will occur more appro- priately when we come to speak of it in particular. Henbane has been long enough known ; but it has always had the misfortune either of a positive bad name, or no one would speak much in its favour, and therefore it has never risen in the world.
The lettuce, which has not been known to us three hundred years, was also known to . the ancients, and its narcotic properties recognized. Dioscorides writes of it, and so also Theophrastus.- It is referred to by Galen, and, if we mistake not, spoken of by Pliny. It was certainly wild, in some of its species, on the hills of Greece, and was culti- vated for the tables of the salad-loving Greeks and Komans. It had been better that some of them had spent more of their time in eating lettuce salads, and by that means had less time to spare for other occupations of a far more reprehensible
k^The “ nepenthes ” of Homer has. already been shown to have found a representativ e in . hemp. There have also been claims made' for considering it as the crocus, or the stigmas of that flower known to us as saffron. Pliny states that it has the power of allaying the fumes of wine, and preventing drunkenness ; and it was taken m drink by great winebibbers, to enable them to drink largely without intoxication. Its properties are of a peculiar character, causing, in large doses, fits of immoderate laughter. The evidence m favour of this being the t ue “nepenthes is, however, we consider very incomplete,, and not so satisfac- tory, by any means, as that given on behalf ot tlio
Indian hemp.
THE SISTERS OF OLD.
17
When the Eoman soldiers retreated from the Parthians, under the command of Antony, Plutarch narrates of them that they suffered great distress for want of provisions, and were urged to eat unknown plants. Among others, they met with a herb that was mortal ; he that had eaten of it lost his memory and his senses, and employed himself wholly in turning about all the stones he could find, and, after vomiting up bile, fell down . dead. Attempts to unravel the mysteries of this . plant have ended, in some cases at least, in referring it to the belladonna, a plant common enough in these our days, and known to possess poisonous properties of a narcotico-acrid character.
An analogous circumstance occurred in the retreat of the Ten Thousand, as related by Xeno- phon. A ear Trebizond were a number of bee- hives, and as many of the soldiers as ate of the honeycombs became senseless, and were seized with vomiting and diarrhoea, and not one of them could stand erect. Those who had swallowed but little looked very like drunken men, those who ate much were like madmen, and some lay as if tying; and thus they lay in such numbers, as on a field of battle after a defeat. And the conster- nation was great; yet no one was found to have died : all recovered their senses about the same
WH°ni th® follo'vln£ day; and on the third or
l?UFth id?7 th®[eafJer> theT rose up as if they had suffered from the drinking of poison.
1 his poisonous property of the honey is said to be derived by the bees from the flowers of a species of rhododendron (Azalea pontica), all of whTch possess narcotic properties
.Supposing that blind old Homer— if ever there was an old Homer, and if blind, no matter— knew the secret of Egyptian Thebes, and the power oT'
18
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
the narcotic hemp, and yet never smoked a hubble- bubble, it is of little consequence, except to the Society of Antiquaries, and certainly makes no difference to Homer now. Although Diagoras condemned Hippocrates for giving too much opium to his patients, we are not informed whether it was administered in the shape of « Tinctura opii,” or “Confectio opii ” or “ Extractum opii,” or “ Godfrey’s cordial,” or “ Paregoric elixir.” The discovery would not lengthen our own lives, and therefore we do not repine. We think that we have some consolation left, in that we are wiser than Homer or Hippocrates in respect , of that particular vanity, called “ shag tobacco, which, we venture to suggest, neither of those veneiable sages ever indulged in during the period of their natural lives. And although Herodotus found the Scythians using, in a strange manner, the tops of the hemp plant, he never got so far as Ivamtschatka, and therefore never saw a man getting drunk upon a toadstool. If he bad ever seen it, he had never slept till he had told it to that posterity which he has left us to enlighten.
THE
CHAPTEK III.
wond’rous weed.
“ Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased ; Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow ;
Kaze out the written troubles of the brain ; And, with some sweet oblivious antidote, Cleanse the stuff ’d bosom of that perilous stuff, Which weighs upon the heart ? ’’—Macbeth.
Amongst Mahometans, the following legend is said to be accepted as an account of the miraculous introduction of the “ wond’rous weed ” to the world.
“ Mahomet, passing the desert in winter, found a poor viper frozen on the ground ; touched with compassion, he placed it in his sleeve, where the warmth and glow of the blessed body restored it to Me. No sooner did the ungrateful reptile find its health restored, than it poked forth its head, and said — 5
“ ‘ Oh, Prophet, I am going to bite you.’ ‘“Give me a sound reason, 0 snake, and I be content.’
will
» i
Your people kill my people constantly, there 18 a? 1 '■)e^ween your race and mine.’
Your people bite my people, the balance Detween our kindred is even, between you and me * Day, h is in my favour, for I have done you good.’
And that you may not do me harm, I will bite you. ’
you.
“ 1 Do not be so ungrateful.’
c 2
20
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
“‘I will ! I have sworn by the Most High that I will.’
“At the Name the Prophet no longer opposed the viper, but bade him bite on, in the name of God. The snake pierced his fangs in the blessed wrist, which the Prophet not liking, shook him off, but did him no further harm,, nor would he suffer those near him to destroy it, but putting his lips to the wound, and sucking out the poison, spat it upon the earth. From these drops sprang that wond’rous weed, which has the bitterness of the serpent’s tooth, quelled by the sweet saliva of the
Prophet.”* , , , A1 ,
Happy Moslem ! you have solved the mystery,
and your heart feels no doubt ; but Christian dogs despairingly sigh for some revelation from the past, whether through history or tradition, ot the first use of this plant. In vain we enquire who it was that first conceived and put in practice the idea of burning the large leaves of a .weed, and drawing in the smoke to spit it out again . W h o
it was that discovered pleasure or amusement m tickling the nose with that “titillating dust to enjoy the luxury of a sneeze or find employment in blowing it out again? \e shades ot heroes departed, that hover around the pine-woods ot the Saskatchewan, sail over the rolling prames of Illinois, or roam along the strands of \ lrgmia, tell us to what illustrious progenitor of Oree or Mohawk we are to accord, the honour of a dis- covery more popular than any since the days when
“ Adam delved and Eve spau * .
In default of the shades giving us the required
information, we must resort to the faint lootst^P® which “ the habit ” has left imprinted on the sands of Time. Even the name by which it is called,
• The Ansayrii and the Assassins, by the Hon. F. Walpole.
THE “WONDROUS WEED."
21
has been disputed and even denied, as of right, belonging to tobacco. This word, Humboldt informs us, like the words savannah, maize , maguey , and vianati , belong to the ancient language of Hayti or St. Domingo, and did not properly denote the herb, but the pipe through which it was smoked. Tobacco, according to Oveido, was indigenous in Hispaniola, and much used by the native Indians, who smoked it from a tube in the shape of the letter Y, the two branches being inserted in the nostrils, and the stem placed in the burning leaves. The plant was called the cohiba , and the rude instrument by which it was inhaled tabaco.
Other fabulous accounts of the origin of this mystic name, which opens the heart and hand of the savage more readily than that of gold, trace it to Tabacco, a province of Yucatan in Hew Spain, whence it is stated to have been first brought to Europe. Or affinity is claimed for it with the Island ,°f Tobago, one of the Caribbees, where it grew wild in abundance. Or its derivation is traced to Tobasco, in the island of Florida. In Mexico it was called yetl: and in Peru sagri, meaning in those languages “the herb,” or the herb par excellence,, worthy of superiority over all other herbs which the earth ever produced from her bosom.
It seems surprising that a vegetable production so universally spread should have different names among neighbouring people. In North America the Algonlun name is serna , and the Huron oyngoua , and the same dissimilarity exists in the languages of South- American tribes ; the Oinamia '
f Terr\j-l itlle Maypm'e> jema ; the Chiquifo, mils ’• the Vilela, tump ; and the Tamanac, cavai. One would have expected to have found names with less variation among such neighbours. It might be urged, perhaps, that these are all independent
22
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
ancient names given by each tribe to the plant before they became acquainted with the existence of their neighbours, and an evidence that its use was not derived from each other, nor from travellers passing among them. To these speculations the theorist is welcome.
There is little reason to doubt that tobacco is a plant indigenous to the New World. With the era, therefore, of Columbus, our knowledge of it will necessarily commence. When the Spaniards landed with that navigator in Cuba in 1492, they found the Cubans doing the same kind of thing as the voyager would now find them occupied in, making and smoking cigars. In the latter act, these Spaniards soon followed the Cuban example, as did those also who landed in 1518, with Fernando Cortez, in the island of Tobago, to a still greater extent. The honour of introducing this, the fairest of “ the Seven Sisters of Sleep,” to European society and soil, is due, perhaps, to Hernandez, the naturalist, who brought the first seeds from Mexico (Humboldt states, from the Mexican province of Yucatan), in 1559, and conveyed them to Spain. About the same time some unknown Flamingo in- troduced the illustrious visitor to Portugal.
Of the introduction of tobacco into France, the more commonly-received opinion is, that the first seeds were sent to Catherine de Medici from Por- tugal in 1560, by Jean Nicot, the French ambas- sador to that country, and ever since it has borne as its generic name a memento of its patron. Other accounts attribute to Father Andre Thevet, or some friend of his, the honour of introducing the raw material to the most accomplished snuff-takers in Europe, and, perhaps, the first who ever indulged in it to any extent.
In Tuscany, tobacco was first cultivated under Cosmo de Medici, who died in 1574. It was origin-
THE “WOND’ROUS WEED.”
23
ally raised by Bishop Alfonso Tournabuoni, from seeds received from his nephew, Nicolo Tourna- buoni, then ambassador at Paris. After him it bore the name of Erba Tournabuoni, as in France it was called Herbe de la Reine. Very early, before 1589, the Cardinal Santa Croce, returning from his nunciature in Spain and Portugal to Italy, carried with him thither tobacco ; but he can scarce claim the honour of its introduction, although the exploit was commemorated by Castor Duranti in Latin verse. Thus it would appear that this plant was brought from Mexico to Spain, whence it passed into France, and thence into Italy, during the early part of the latter half of the sixteenth century.
The first introduction of tobacco into England has been claimed for a trinity of valiant knights — Sir Francis Drake, Sir John Plawkins, and Sir Walter Raleigh. In Bancroft’s “ History of the United States,” it is said — “ The exiles of a year had grown familiar with the favourite amusement of the lethargic Indians, and they introduced into England the general use of tobacco.” These exiles were brought home by Drake before Raleigh visited the New World, and the period for the introduction of tobacco into this country by Sir Francis, claims the date of 1560. For Sir John Hawkins’ intro- duction, the time has been fixed at 1565; whilst the earliest date assigned for its introduction by Sir Walter Raleigh is 1584, the same year in which a proclamation was issued in England against it. Humboldt states that the celebrated Raleigh con- tributed most to introduce the custom of smoking among the nations of the North. When Raleigh brought tobacco from Virginia to England, whole fields of it were already cultivated in Portugal. It was also previously known in France, where it was brought into fashion by Catherine de Medicis. As
24 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
early as tlie end of the sixteenth century, bitter complaints were made in England of this imitation of the manners of a savage people. It was feared, that by the practice of smoking tobacco, English- men would degenerate into a barbarous state.* The cultivation of this narcotic plant preceded that of the potato in Europe 120 or 140 years.
Camden, who informs us of these fears for the civilization of England, also states that Eichard Fletcher, Bishop of London, a courtly prelate (who died in 1596), by the use of tobacco “ smothered the cares he took by means of his unlucky mar- riage.” According to Aubrey, the pipe was handed from man to man round the table ; and this bears, certainly, a great resemblance to the custom of the North- American Indians — the chief smoking two or three whiffs, then passing it to his neigh- bour*, until from one to another it passes round the circle, and comes back to the first smoker again.
M. Jorevin, a Frenchman, who visited England in Charles the Second’s time, says that the women smoked tobacco as well as the men.
From England the practice of smoking was car- ried to the Continent. Dutch students were first taught the art of smoking at tire University of Leyden by students from England ; hence the greatest smokers in Europe derived their know- ledge of the use of the pipe from the English.
Lilly, in his autobiography, informs us that when committed to the guard-room in Whitehall, he thought himself in regions far below, where Orpheus sang, and Pluto reigned, for “ some were
* “ Ex illo sane tempore [tabacum] usn cepit esse creberrimc in Anglifi, et magno pretio dum quam plurimi graveoleutem illius fumutn per tubulum tcstaceum hauriunt et mox e naribus efliant ; adco ut Anglorum corporum in barbaroram naturam degenerasse videantur quum iidem ac barbari dclectentur.” — • Camden, Annal. Elizab., p. 143. (15S5.)
THE “ wond’hous weed.”
25
sleeping, others swearing, others smoking tobacco ; and in the chimney of the room were two bushels of broken tobacco-pipes.” Good friend Lilly, what wouldst thou have thought of a visit to a Studenten Kneipe, where a crowd of students, amid fumes dense as a London fog in November, scream and growl the well-known song —
“And smokes the Fox tobacco 1
And smokes the Fox tobacco ?
And smokes the leathery Fox tobacco ?
Sa! Sa!
Fox tobacco.
And smokes the Fox tobacco.
“ Then let him fill a pipe !
Then let him fill a pipe !
Then let him fill a leathery pipe ;
Sa ! Sa !
Leathery pipe.
Then let him fill a pipe !”
And then perhaps — but let the reader enquire for himself of some descendant from the ancestors of the renowned Wouter Van Twiller, the worthy head of the long-pipe faction. In 1601, tobacco was carried to Java, whence it spread over the East. It was also conveyed to Turkey and Arabia m the beginning of this century. El-Is-hakee states that the custom of smoking tobacco began to be common in Egypt between the years of the flight, 1010 and 1012 (a.d. 1601-1603). And from Persian writers on J\fateiia medica , it appears to have been introduced into India in A.n. 1014 (a.d. 1605), towards the end of the reign of Jcla- ladeen Akbar Padshaw. From India, tobacco probably found its way to the Malayan Peninsula and China ; although Pallas, Loureiro, and Kum- phuis think that tobacco was known in China before the discovery of the New World, and that
26
THE SEVEN SISTERS OP SLEEP.
the Chinese tobacco plant is indigenous to that country.
From “Notes and Queries” we learn that u tobacco was first cultivated in this country at Winchcombe in Gloucestershire, and that the natives did suck thereout no small advantage J and before the time of James II. the best Vir- ginia was but two shillings the pound, and two gross of the best glazed pipes, and a box with them, three shillings and fourpence.” Tobacco became almost a necessary among the upper classes; nor could the parliamentary representa- tives of the city of Worcester be despatched up to town until the “ collective wisdom ” had smoked and drunk sack at the “ Globe,” or some other hostelry. As early as 1621, it was moved in the House of Commons by Sir William Stroud, that “he would have tobacco banished wholly out of the kingdom, and that it may not be brought from any part, nor used amongst us.” And by Sir ; Grey Palmes, “ that if tobacco be not banished, it will overthrow 100,000 men in England, for it is now so common, that he hath seen ploughmen j take it as they are at the plough.” At a later period of the same century, so inveterate had the practice become, that an order appears on the journals of the House, “That no member in the House do presume to smoke tobacco in the gallery^ or at the table of the House sitting at Committees. .
But tobacco did not come into general use in Europe without great and strenuous opposition. All kinds of weapons were called in requisition to stay its progress. Persuasion and force were alike essayed without effect. A German writer has collected the titles of a hundred different works condemning its use, which were published within half a century of its introduction into Europe. The pen was wielded by royal as well as plebeian
THE “WOND’rOUS WEED.”
27
fingers, and the famous diatribe of the British. Solomon, King James I., of blessed memory, defender of the faith, and antagonist of tobacco, keeps his memory still green in the hearts of Englishmen. In Russia, the snuff-taker was ingeni- ously cured of the habit, by having his nose cut off, while smokers had a pipe bored through the same useful projection. Michael Feodorovitch Tourieff kindly offered a bastinado to the Musco- vites for the first offence, cutting off the nose for the second, and the head for the third. In 1590 Pope Innocent XII. took the trouble to excommu- nicate all who used tobacco in any form in the church of St. Peters in Pome. And in 1624, Pope Urban VII., the old woman, fulminated a bull against all persons found taking snuff during divine service; and old women, in the spirit of opposition, have been fond of snuff ever since. The sultans and priests of Persia and Turkey declared smoking a sin against their religion. Amurath IV. of Persia published an edict, making the smoking of tobacco a capital offence. Shah Abbas II. punished such delinquents equally severely. When leading an army against the Cham of Tartary, he proclaimed that every soldier in whose possession tobacco was found, would have his nose and lips cut off, and afterwards be burnt alive.. El-Gabartee relates, that about a century ago, in the time of Mohammed Basha El-Yedek- shee, who governed Egypt in the years of the flight, 1156-8, it frequently happened that, when a man was found with a pipe in his hand in Cairo, he was made to eat the bowl with its burning, contents. This may seem incredible but a pipe bowl may be broken by strong teeth* particularly if it be of meerschaum. In Tuscany* the growth of tobacco was prohibited, except in a tew localities, where it was allowed, under certain
28
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
restrictions, from 1645 to 1789, when the Grand Duke Peter Leopold declared its cultivation free all over the country. Ferdinand III. afterwards restricted it to its former localities. The number of these were reduced in 1826, and in 1830 its growth was entirely prohibited. In Transylvania the penalty for growing tobacco was a total confis- cation of property ; and for the use of the weed, a i fine of from three to two hundred florins. In 1661, the Canton of Berne introduced an eleventh commandment to the decalogue, and this was inserted after the seventh, “ Thou shalt not smoke!” In 1719, the wise senate of Strasburg prohibited the cultivation of tobacco, fearing lest it should interfere with the growth of com. Prussia and Denmark contented themselves with prohibiting its use. This brings us back again to England, and the days of “ good Queen Bess.” That lady, who is said to have prohibited the use of tobacco in churches, according to certain chro- niclers, was wont to banter Sir Walter Raleigh on his affection for his protege. It is said, that on one occasion, when Raleigh was conversing, with his royal mistress upon the singular properties of this new and extraordinary herb, he assured her Majesty that he had so well experienced the nature of it, that he could tell her of what weight I even the smoke would be in any quantity pro- \ posed to be consumed. Her Majesty, deeming it \ impossible to hold the smoke in a balance, must ] needs lay a wager to solve the doubt. Raleigh • procured the quantity agreed upon, he thoroughly I smoked it, and weighed the ashes; pleading at the I same lime that the weight now wanting was the 1 wei-dit of the smoke dissipated in the process. The Queen did not deny the doctrine of her . favourite, saying “that she had often heard or those who had turned their gold into smoke, but -
THE “WOND’ROUS WEED.” 29
Raleigh was the first who had turned his smoke into gold.”
The Star Chamber levied a heavy duty, and Charles II. prohibited its cultivation in England. Tobacco was first put under the excise in 1789. It was not at first allowed to be smoked in ale-houses. “ There is a curious collection of proclamations, &c. says Brand, “in the archives of the Society of Antiquaries of London. In vol. viii. is an ale- house licence, granted by six Kentish justices of the peace, at the bottom of which is the following item, among other directions to the inn-liolder : — i Item. — You shall not utter, nor willingly suffer to be uttered, drunke, or taken, any tobacco ■within your house, cellar, or other place thereunto be- longing.’ ”
notwithstanding oppositions, imposts, anathe- mas, counterblasts, and persecutions, tobacco gradually and rapidly arose in popular esteem. The first house in which it was publicly smoked in Britain was the Pied Bull, at Islington ; but this was “alone in its glory” for a very brief period of time. “ Is it not a great vanity,” saith Royal James, u that a man cannot heartily wel- come his friend now, but straight they must be in hand with tobacco ? And he that will refuse to take a pipe of tobacco amongst his fellows is accounted peevish, and no good company; yea, the mistress cannot in a more mannerly kind entertain her servant than by giving him out of her fair hand a pipe of tobacco.” Raleigh smoked m his dungeon in the Tower, while the headsman was grinding his axe. Cromwell loved his pipe and dictated his despatches to Milton over some burning Trinidado, or sweet-smelling nicotine. Ben. Johnson affirmed that tobacco was the most precious weed that the earth ever tendered to the tse of man. Dr. Radcliffb recommended snuff to
30
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
his brethren. Dr. Johnson kept his snuff in his waistcoat pocket ; and so did Frederick the Great. Robert Hall smoked in liis vestry, and, it would seem, in other places as well, for Gilfillan informs us, that when on a visit to a brother clergyman, he went into the kitchen where a pious servant girl, whom he loved, was working. He lighted his pipe, sat down, and asked her — “ Betty, do you love the Lord Jesus Christ ?” I hope I do, sir, was the reply.. He immediately added, “ Betty, do you love me ?” They were married. And Napoleon took rappee by the handful. And poets wrote, and minstrels sang, in the praise of the “ Divine Virginia.”
“ Thou glorious weed of a glorious land,
I would not be freed from thy magical wand—
Though a slave to thy fetters, and bound in thy chain, Despairing of freedom, I cannot complain.
“ Tobacco, I love thee— I bow at thy shrine !
The longer I prove thee, the less I repine.
The affection I cherish, no time can assuage—
Thy joys do not perish, like others, with age.
The mailed Spaniard and red-plumed Indian have fought around it ; and gold-seekers have drenched "it with the gore of negroes. One whole continent has been enriched by it ; and to cultivate it another continent has been depopulated. Ne- m-oes have prayed to their Fetishes beside it— many a Cacique now dead smoked it at the war- council, and many a grave, grey-bearded Spaniard, who had fought at Lepanto, or bled in the Low Countries. Old soldiers of Cromwell have smoked it • and while Indians have bartered their gold tor English beads, the swarthy Buccaneers looked on, handling their loaded muskets. Tobacco was for some time used as currency in Virginia, as, accord- ing to Mr. Galton, is the case now among the
THE “ WONDROUS WEED.”
31
Damaras, Ovampo, and other tribes of South- Western Africa.
Forty varieties of tobacco have been described ; but the differences are mainly the result of climate, and the mode of culture. It grows well in almost every part of the world. The northern limit in Scandinavia is 62°-63° N. L. The different parts of America in which it is grown include Canada, New Brunswick, United States, Mexico, the Western Coast, as far as 40° S. L. In Africa it is cultivated by the Bed Sea and Mediter- ranean, in Egypt, Algeria, the Canaries, the Western Coast, the Cape, and numerous places in the interior. In Europe, it has been raised successfully in almost every country ; in Hungary, Germany, Flanders, and France, it forms an important agricultural product. In Asia, it has spread over Turkey, Persia, India, Thibet, China, Japan, the Philippines, Java, and Ceylon. In paits of Australia and New Zealand. From the Equator to 50° N. L., it may be raised without difficulty. The finest qualities are raised between 15° and 35° N.L.
The most noted tobacco is that of Cuba; and the most extensive growers are the Americans of me United States. Two-thirds of our supply is doubtless derived from the latter source.
In 1665, Virginia exported to England 60,000 pounds. Twenty-five years afterwards, our total imports were double that amount ; while in 1858 they amounted to62,217,705 pounds, including snuff and cigars; hence, we may fairly calculate that, in '-rreat Britain, eight millions of pounds sterling are annually spent in tobacco.
has been computed that eight hundred mil-
nnS\°u ;h® human race are consumers of tobacco, that the average annual consumption is 70 ces per head. The total consumption would,
32
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
therefore, approximate to two millions of tons. The average annual consumption of every male over eighteen years of age, in each of the following countries of Europe, as collected from returns, is, in Austria, 108 ounces; Zollverein, 156 ounces; Steurverein, including Hanover and Oldenburg, 200 ounces ; France, 88 ounces ; Russia, 40 ounces ; Portugal, 56 ounces; Spain, 76 ounces; Sardinia, 44 ounces ; Tuscany, 40 ounces ; the Papal States, 32 ounces ; England, 60 ounces ; Holland, 132 ounces ; Belgium, 144 ounces ; Denmark, 128 ounces ; Sweden, 70 ounces ; and Norway, 99 ounces. In the United States of America, the consumption is 122 ounces ; and in New South Wales, where there are no restrictive duties, it is declared to exceed 400 ounces.
“ Jamie, thou shouldst been living at this hour,
Europe hath need of thee.”
To what a height of royal indignation the “ Misocapnos” would have risen, had its author postponed its publication 250 years, and re- appeared, a “new avater,” to see it through the press in these latter days. He had then required no Spanish matches to set him on fire; and the « horrible Stygian smoake” would have required the addition of all Catesby’s gunpowder to have made the simile worthy of its royal master, im- lcss, peradventure, the weight of five millions of "olden sovereigns from the Inland Revenue Office had pressed heavily upon his conscience, and he had purchased himself a new pair of silk stockings, and rested in peace; then he could have returned the old pair lie borrowed in his Scotch capital, m which to meet his English Coui t at London.
Since the days when the green leaf of tobacco was used as a sovereign application for wounds and bruises and the bites of poisonous serpents,.
THE “WONDROUS WEED.”
33
there has been no more singular use discovered for any part of this plant than that of certain African tribes, who, Denham says, “ colour their teeth and lips with the flowers of the goorjee tree and the tobacco plant. The former, he saw only once or twice ; the latter, was carried every day to market at Bornou, beautifully arranged in large baskets. The flowers of both these plants rubbed on the lips and teeth give them a blood-red appearance, which is there thought a great beauty.” That the poison of tobacco should have been turned to account is not surprising ; and we are more prepared to hear of the bushmen of South Africa poisoning the heads of their arrows, not with nicotine, but with a poison taken from the head of the yellow serpent. These serpents they kill with the oil of tobacco, one drop or two producing spasms and death. Count Bocarme effectually settled the question of the poisonous property of nicotine, some years since at Mons. It remained for future experimentalists to discover that as well as a bane, tobacco was an antidote.
A young lady in New Hampshire fell into the mistake ot eating a portion of arsenic, which had been prepared for the destruction of rats. Painful symptoms soon led to the discovery. An elderly lady, then present, advised that she should bemade to vomit as speedily as possible, and as the unfor- tunate victim had always exhibited a loathing for tobacco in any shape, that was suggested as a ready means of obtaining the desired end. A pine was uSed but this produced no nausea. A large p jition of strong tobacco was then chewed, and
sensation 7r °VCn this *d no
“ f®,0 disgust. A strong decoction was then
wUhouTtod4 Wter’ 0f this drank half a pint
emetic torP ™«C‘1? nal'.soa 01' Si(MineS3, or any emetic or cathartic action. The pains gradually
34
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
subsided, and she began to feel well. On the arrival of physicians, an emetic was administered. Tlie patient recovered, and no ill consequences were experienced. Another case occurred a few years subsequent at the same place, when tobacco was administered and no other remedy. In this instance there was complete and perfect recovery. From this it may be reasonably concluded, that tobacco is an antidote of very safe and ready application in cases of poisoning by arsenic.
Financiers and Chancellors of Exchequers or Ministers of Finance, look with particularly favourable eyes upon the “ Indian Weed/’ Our own official in that department, can now calculate on nearly six millions of safe income in his esti- mates for a year, from this fertile source. Our near neighbours of France consider four millions too good an addition to the revenue, to denounce its use. Austria and Spain each manages to supply the state coffers with a million and a half of money from the tobacco monopoly. Russia, the Zollverein, Portugal, Sardinia, and the Papal States, individually realizes from three to four hundred thousands of pounds every year, from the use or abuse of this most popular plant in the world.
Although this habit, in its increase, may cause throbs of ecstatic -joy in the breasts of certain officials, there are other sections of society holding antagonistic opinions. The Maine Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at a late session, passed the following preamble and resolutions AVhcrGcis — The use ot tobcicco pre\nils to & prodigious extent in our country, as indicated m the reports of our national treasury, and other authentic documents, from which it appears tha over 100,000,000 pounds of this article are con- sumed in the United States annually, at a cost to
THE “WONDROUS WEED.”
35
the consumers of over 20,000,000 dollars, and whereas, we have reason to believe that its use is rapidly increasing, and that even ministers of the Gospel are becoming,- to a great extent, guilty of this debasing indulgence ; therefore —
£' I. — Resolved. That we view these facts as a matter of profound alarm, and such an evil as to demand the serious attention of the Church.
“II- — Resolved. That we regard the use of
tobacco as an expensive and needless indulgence, unfavourable to cleanliness and good manners, unbecoming in Christians, and especially in Christian Ministers, and, like the use of alcohol, a violation of the laws of physical, intellectual, and moral life.
III. — Resolved. “ That we will discountenance the use of that injurious narcotic, except as a medicine prescribed by a physician, by precept and example, and by all proper means.”
De Lagny states that the “Old Believers” a sect of dissenters from the Greek Church in Russia look wi th horror on the use of tobacco. The Wahhabees, a Pharasaical sect of strict Moslems are rigid in their condemnation of tobacco, and in their adherence to the precepts of the Koran, and the traditions of the Prophet.
There are to be met with nearer home, those who are inveterate against its use, and who wil- J01n with Cowper in denouncing the
“Pernicious weed which banishes for hours,
That sex whose presence civilizes ours.”
w_fn- °fCc^ion1al pamphlet or letter, makes its nt° the hands of speculative publishers or m “uC T paP?ra' S‘™S gratuitous advice, and
which is bvT,CT0ry lan®uagc’ aSainst a kabit too mom by f -t0° ^eral, and has been tested by too many experiments not to be well known, and
d 2
36
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
equally well understood. These “counterblasts’ differ but little from the model one which each would seem to aim at imitating — the quaint expressions, the only redeeming quality in the original, alone being wanting.
“ Surely,” saith the high and mightie Prince James, ££ smoke becomes a kitchen farre better than a dining chamber ; and yet it makes a kitchen oftentimes in the inward parts of men, soyling and infecting them with an unctuous and oyly kind of soote, as hath been found in some great tobacco takers, that after their death were opened. Now, my good countrymen, let us (I pray you), consider what honour or policie can move us to imitate the barbarous and beasflie manners of the wild, god- lesse, and slavish Indians, especially in so vile and filthy a custome. Shall we, that disdain to imitate the manner of our neighbour, France (having the style of the greate Christian langdome), and that cannot endure the spirit of the Spaniards, (their king being now comparable in largenesse of dominions to the greatest Emperor of Turkey), shall we, I say, that have been so long cmll and wealthy in peace, famous and invincible in war, fortunate in both— we that have been ever able to aid any of our neighbours (but never deafened any of their ears with any of our supplications for assistance), shall we, I say, without blushing, abase ourselves so far as to imitate these beasthe Indians, slaves to the Spaniards, the refuse of the worlde and, as yet, aliens from the holy covenant of God ? Why do we not as well imitate them in walkm0 naked as they do, in preferring glasses fathers and toys, to gold and precious stones, as they do t Yea why do we not deny God, and adore the devils, as^hey do? Have you not, then, reasons to forbear this filthie noveltie, so basely grounded so foolishly received, and so grosslie mistaken m
THE “WOND’ROUS WEED.”
37
the right use thereof ? In your abuse thereof, sinning against God, harming yourselves both in person and goods, and raking also, thereby, the marks and notes of vanitie upon you, by the custom thereof, making yourselves to be wondered at by all forreine civill nations, and by all strangers that come among you, to be scorned and con- temned ; a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to to the nose, harmfull to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and, in the blacke stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoake of the pit that is bottomless.”
Wise and worthy king, adieu. Gold stick, lead the way. We hasten from your royal presence to join the Cabinet of Oloudland. Vive la Virginie!
CHAPTER IV.
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
“ A magnificent array of clouds ;
And as the breeze plays on them, they assume The forms of mountains, castled cliffs, and hills,
And shadowy glens, and groves, and beetling rocks; And some, that seem far off, are voyaging Their sunbright path in folds of silver.”
u Right,” said I to myself, as I lay down the volume of Hyperion, in which I had been glancing for repose. u I, too, have a friend, not yet a sexa- genary bachelor, but a bachelor notwithstanding. He has one of those well oiled dispositions which turn upon the hinges of the world without creak- ing, except during east winds, and when there is no butter in the house. The hey-day of life is over with him ; but his old age (begging his pardon) is sunny and chirping, and a merry heart still nestles in his tottering frame, like a swallow that builds in a tumble-down chimney. He is a professed Squire of Dames. The rustle of a silk ^own is music to his ears, and his imagination is continually lantern-led by some wiU-witb-the-wisp in the shape of a lady’s stomacher. In his devo- tion to the fair sex — the muslin, as lie calls it he is the gentle flower of chivalry. It is amusing to see how quickly he strikes into the scent of a lady’s handkerchief. ' When once fairly in pursuit, there is no such thing as throwing him out. His heart looks out at his eye ; and Ins inward delight tingles down to the tail of his coat. He loves to
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
39
bask in the sunshine of a smile; when he can breathe the sweet atmosphere of kid gloves and cambric handkerchiefs, his soul is in its element ; and his supreme delight is to pass the morning, to use his own quaint language, c in making dodging calls, and wriggling round among the ladies/ ” Yet there are a few little points in the picture which want retouching, and beyond all, one great omission to be remedied. It is the pipe. What would the worthy Abbot be without his pipe ? Just as un- comfortable as we should presume a dog to be without his tail. As incomplete as a sketch of Napoleon without his boots and cocked-hat. See hira in a cloud, and he seems the very Premier of Cloudland. It was said of Staines, Lord Mayor of London, that he could not forego his pipe long enough to be sworn into office, without a whiff; and a print was published representing his lordship smoking in his state carriage ; the sword bearer smoking — the mace bearer smoking — the coach- men smoking — the footmen smoking — the posti- lions smoking — and, to crown the whole — all the six horses smoking also. The ninth of November on which this event occurred, must needs have been a cloudy day.
Another cloudy day arose upon London when the great plague broke out, and on this occasion, the smoke of tobacco mingled with the gloom. In Reliquiae Hearnianae, it is stated that “ none who kept tobacconist’s shops had the plague. It is cer- tain that smoking was looked upon as a most ex- cellent preservative, insomuch, that even children were obliged to smoke. And I remember ” con- tinues the writer, « that I heard formerly Tom Kogers, who was yeoman beadle, say, that when he was that year when the plague raged, a schoolboy t Lton, all the boys of that school were obliged to smoke in the school every morning, and that he
40 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
was never whipped so much in his life as he was one morning for not smoking.” We may imagine the experiences of some of these urchins at their first or second attempt, and in remembrance, it may be, of some similar experience of our own, see no cause for wonder at Tom Rogers not liking to elevate his yard of clay, and view the curls of smoke arise from the ashes of the smouldering weed. Another amateur who flourished after the great fire had burnt out all traces of the great plague, has left us the record of his “ day of smoke,” and the cudgelling he received for doing that which Tom Rogers was whipped for not doing —
“ I shall never forget the day when I first smoked. It was a day of exultation and humilia- tion. It was a Sunday. My uncle was a great smoker. He dined with us that day ; and after the meal, he pulled out his cigar case, took a cheroot, and smoked it. I always liked the fumes of tobacco, so I went near him and observed how he put the cheroot into his mouth, the way he inhaled the smoke, how he puffed it out again, and the other coquetries of a regular smoker. I envied my uncle, and was determined that I would smoke myself. Uncle fell asleep. How, thought I, here’s an opportunity not to he lost. I quietly abstracted three cigars from the case which was lying on the table, and sneaked off. Being a lad of a generous disposition, I wislicd that my brothers and cousins should also partake of the heneiits of a smoke, so I imparted the secret to them, at which’ they were highly pleased.- When and where to smoke was the next consideration. It was arranged that when the old people had gone to church in the evening, we should smoke ni the coach-house. We were six in number. I divided the three cigars into halves, and gave each a piece. Oh, how our hearts did palpitate
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
41
with joy ! Fire was stealthily brought from the cook-house, and we commenced to light our cigars. Such puffing I never did see. After each puff we would open our mouths quite wide, to let the smoke out. At the performance of the first puff we laughed heartily — the smoke coming out of our mouths was so funny. At the second puff we didn’t laugh so much, but began to spit ; we thought the cigars were very bitter. After the third puff we looked steadfastly at each other — each thought the other looked pale. I could not give the word of command for another pull. I felt choked, and my teeth began to chatter. There was a dead silence for a second. We were ashamed, or could not divulge the state of our feelings. Charlie was the first who gave symptoms of re- bellion in his stomach. Then there was a general revolt. What occurred afterwards I did not know, till I got up from my bed next morning, to expe- rience the delights of a sound flagellation. After that I abhorred the smell of tobacco — would never look at a cigar or think of it.” All this happened, as the narrator informed us, at the age of seven— an early age, some may imagine, who do not know that in Yizagapatam and other places on the same coasts, where the women smoke a great deal, it is a common thing for the mothers to appease their squalling brats by transferring the cigar from their own mouths to that of their infants. These young- sters being accustomed to the art of pulling, suck away gloriously for a second, and then fall asleep.
Howard Malcom states, “that in Burmah the consumption of tobacco for smoking is very great, not in pipes, but in cigars or cheroots, with wrappers made of the leaves of the Then-net tree. In making them, a little of the dried root, chopped nne, is added, and sometimes a small portion of sugar, ihese are sold at a rupee per thousand.
42
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
Smoking is more prevalent than c chewing coon ’ among both sexes, and is commenced by children almost as soon as they are weaned. I have seen,” he continues, “ little creatures of two or three years, stark naked, tottering about with a lighted cigar in their mouth. It is not uncommon for them to become smokers even before they are weaned — the mother often taking the cheroot from her mouth and putting it into that of the infant.”
In China, the practice is so universal, that every female, from the age of eight or nine years, as an appendage to her dress, wears a small silken pocket to hold tobacco and a pipe.
The use of tobacco has become universal through the Chinese empire; men, women, children, every- body smokes almost without ceasing. They go about their daily business, cultivate the fields, ride on horseback, and write constantly with the pipe in their mouths. During their meals, if they stop for a moment, it is to smoke a pipe ; and if they wake in the night, they are sure to amuse themselves in the same way. It may easily be supposed, there- fore, that in a country containing, according to M. Hue, 300,000,000 of smokers, without counting the tribes of Tartary and Thibet, who lay in their stocks in the Chinese markets, the culture of tobacco has become very important. The cultiva- tion is entirely free, every one being at liberty to plant it in his garden, or in the open fields, in whatever quantity he chooses, and afterwards to sell it, wholesale or retail, just as he likes, without the Government interfering with him in the slightest degree. The most celebrated tobacco is that obtained in Leao-tong in Mantchuria, and in the province of Sse-tchouen. The leaves, before becoming articles of commerce, undergo various preparatory processes, according to the practice of the locality. In the South, they cut them into ex-
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
43
tremely fine filaments; tlie people of the North content themselves with drying them and rubbing them up coarsely, and then stuff them at once into their pipes.
According to etiquette and the custom of the court, Persian princes must have seven hours for sleep. When they get up, they begin to smoke the narghile or shishe, and they continue smoking all day long. When there is company, the narghile is first presented to the chief of the assembly, who, after two or three whiffs, hands it to the next, and so on it goes descending; but in general, the great smoke only with the great, or with strangers of distinction. The Schali smokes by himself, or only with one of his brothers, the tombak, the smoke of which is of a very superior kind, the odour being exquisite. It is the finest tombak of Shiraz.
Mr. Neale says — c‘ Talk about the Turks being great , smokers ; why, the Siamese beat them to nothing. I have often seen a child only just able to toddle about, and certainly not more than two years of age, quit its mother’s breast to go and get a whiff from papa’s cigaret, or, as they are here termed, borees— cigarets made of the dried leaf of the plantain tree, inside of which the tobacco is rolled up.”
In Japan, after tea. drinking, the apparatus for smoking is brought in, consisting of a hoard of wood or brass, though not always of the same structure, upon which are placed a small fire-pan with coals, a pot to spit in, a small box filled with tobacco cut small, and some long pipes with small brass heads, as also another japanned board or cush, with socano — that is, sometliing to eat, such as tigs, nuts, cakes, and sweetmeats. “ There are no other spitting pots,” says Kocmpfer, “brought nto the room but those which come along with the
44
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
tobacco. If there be occasion for more, they make use of small pieces of bamboo, a band broad and high being sawed from between the joints and hollowed.”
In Nicaragua, the dress of the urchins, from twelve or fourteen downwards, consists generally of a straw hat and a cigar — the latter sometimes unlighted and stuck behind the ear, but oftener lighted and stuck in the mouth — a costume sufficiently airy and picturesque, and excessively cheap. The women have their hair braided in two long locks, which hang down behind, and and give them a school-girly look, quite out of keeping with the cool deliberate manner in which they puff their cigars, occasionally forcing the smoke in jets from their nostrils.*
On the Amazon, all persons — men and women — use tobacco in smoking ; when pipes are wanting, they make cigarillos of the fine tobacco, wrapped in a paper-like bark, called Toware ; and one of these is passed round, each person, even to the little boys, taking two or three puffs in his turn.f The Papuans pierce their ears and insert in the orifice, ornaments or cigars of tobacco, rolled in pandan leaf, of which they are great consumers.
A Spaniard knows no crime so black that it should be visited by the deprivation of tobacco. In the Havana, the convict who is deprived of the ordinary comforts, or even of the necessaries of life, may enjoy his cigar, if he can beg or borrow it ; if he stole it, the offence would be considered venial. At the doorway of most of the shops hang little sheet-iron boxes filled with lighted coals, at which the passer-by may light cigars; and on the balustrade of the staircase of every
* Squier’s “ Nicaragua.” t Edwards’ “ Voyage up the Amazon.”
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
45
house stands a small chafing dish for the same purpose. Fire for his cigar, is the only thing for which a Spaniard does not think it necessary to ask and thank with ceremonious courtesy. If he has permitted his cigar to go out, he steps up to the first man he meets — nobleman or galley slave, as the case may be — and the latter silently hands his smoking weed ; for it is impossible that two Spaniards should meet and not have one lighted cigar between them. The light obtained, the lightee returns the cigar to the lighter in silence. A shorthand suddenly checked motion of the hand, as the cigar is extended, is the only acknowledg- ment of the courtesy. This is never, however, omitted. . Women smoke as well as men ; and in a full railroad car, every person, man, woman, and child, may be seen smoking. To placard “ no smok- ing allowed;'' and enforce it, would ruin the road.
A regular smoker in Cuba will consume perhaps twenty or thirty cigars a day, but they are all fresh. What we call a fine old cigar, a Cuban would not smoke.
At Manilla, the women smoke as well as the men. One manufactory employs about 9,000 women in making the Manilla cheroots ; another establishment employs 3,000 men in making paper cigars or cigarettes. The paper cigars are chiefly smoked by men ; the women prefer the “ puros ” the largest they can get. 5
The Binua of Johore, of both sexes, indulge rrv.C ^ tobacco. It is their favourite luxury. 1 he women are often seen seated together weaving- mats; and each with a cigar in her mouth. When speaking, it is transferred to the perforation in he ear. When met paddling their canoes the cigar is seldom wanting. The Mintira women
smoke°itmUC 1 addlcted to tobacco> but they do not
46
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
In South America, many of the tribes are free indulgers in tobacco ; and this extends also to the female and juvenile sections of the community. A story, which Signor Calistro narrated to Mr. Wallace whilst travelling in the interior of Brazil, shows that it was nothing but a common occur- rence for little girls' to smoke. This story is in itself interesting considered apart from all circum- stances of veracity. “ There was a negro who had a pretty wife, to whom another negro was rather attentive when be had an opportunity. One day the husband went out to hunt, and the other party thought it a good opportunity to pay a visit to the lady. The husband, however, returned rather unexpectedly, and the visitor climbed up on the rafters to be out of sight, among the old boards and baskets that were stowed away there. The husband put his gun by in a corner, and called to his wife to get Ins supper, and then sat down in his hammock. Casting his eyes up to the raffers, he saw a leg protruding from among the baskets, and thinking it something supernatural, crossed himself, and said, ‘ Lord deliver us from the legs appearing overhead !’ The other, hearing this, attempted to draw up his legs out of sight; but, losing his balance, came down suddenly on the floor in front of the astonished husband, who, half-frightened, asked, c Where do you come from ?’ ‘ I have just
come from heaven,’ said the other, k and have brought you news of your little daughter Maria.
‘ Oh, wife, wife ! come and see a man who has brought us news of our little daughter Maria!’ then, turning to the visitor, continued, ‘and what was my little daughter doing when you left?’ ‘ Ob, she was sitting at the feet of the Virgin with a golden crown on her head, and smoking a golden pipe a yard long.’ ‘ And did she send any message to us P’ ‘ Oh, yes ; she sent many remembrances,
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
47
and begged you to send her two pounds of your tobacco from the little rhoosa ; they have not got any half so good up there.’ ‘ Oh, wife, wife, bring two pounds of our tobacco from the little rhoosa, for our daughter Maria is in heaven, and she says they have not any half so good up there.’ So the tobacco was brought, and the visitor was departing, when he was asked, 1 Are there many white men up there?’ ‘Very few,' he replied; ‘they are all down below with the diabo.’ ‘ I thought so,’ the other replied, apparently quite satisfied ; ‘ good night.’ ” On the Orinoco, tobacco has been cultivated by the native tribes from time immemorial. The amanacs and the Maypures of Guiana wrap maize leaves around their cigars as did the Mexicans at the time of the arrival of Cortes ; and, as in Chili is done at the present day. The Spaniards have substituted paper for the maize husks, in imitation of them. 1 he little cigarettes of Chili are called Ao/ztas They are about two inches and a half long, filled with coarsely powdered tobacco. As eir use is apt to stain the fingers of the smoker the fashionable young gentlemen carry a pair of de- licate gold tweezers for holding them. The cinar p 80 Snia11 tllat & requires not more than three&or
i tervAn,UteS t0 Sm°ke °na The7 serve t0 AH up the ttetpn ® conversation. At tertulias, the gen- craen sometimes retire to a balcony to smoke one or two cigars after a dance.
knmv° 1,001 1{ndians of tbe forests of the Orinoco MonfpWe 1 “ Cud the Sreat nobles of the Court excellent zuma’.that the smoke of tobacco is an So af»rCOUO ; ”d they "se it. “Ot only to pro wiescencp Aap’ bllt alsr> to lndlloe a state o£
lien At tl n "'-v cail dreaming with the eyes If ^ourt.of Montezuma the pipe was with 'a,K . wdile the nostrils were stopped
wrth the other. m order that the smote ndght be
48
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
more easily swallowed. Bernal Diaz also informs us, that after Montezuma had dined, they presented to him three little canes, highly ornamented, con- taining liquid amher, mixed with a herb they call tobacco, and when he had sufficiently viewed and heard the singers, he took a little of the smoke of one of these canes, and then laid himself down to sleep. A tribe of Indians originally inhabiting Panama, improved upon this method, which occu- pied both hands, and involved considerable trouble ; the method adopted by the chiefs and great men of this tribe, was to employ servants to blow, tobacco smoke in their faces, which was convenient and encouraged their indolence ; they indulged in the luxury of tobacco in no other way.
Amongst the Bocky Mountain Indians, it is a universal practice to indulge in smoking, and when they do so they saturate their bodies in smoke. They use but little tobacco, mixing with it a plant which renders the fume less offensive. It is a social luxury, for the enjoyment of which, they form a circle, and only one pipe is used. Ihe principal chief begins by drawing three whiffs, the first of which he sends upward, and then passes the pipe to the person next in dignity, and in like manner the instrument passes round imtil it comes to the first chief again. He then draws four whiffs, the last of which he blows through his nose, in two columns, in circling ascent, as through a double fined chimney ; and their pipes are not of the race stigmatized by Knickerbocker as plebeian. None ot the smoke of those villanous short pipes, con- tinually ascending in a cloud about the nose, penetrating into and befogging the cerebellum, drying up all the kindly moisture of the brain, ana rendering the people who use them vapourish and testy ; or, what is worse, from being goodly, burly, sleek-conditioned men, to become like the Dutcli
THE CABINET OP CLOUDLAND.
49
yeomanry who smoked short pipes, a lantern-jawed, smoke-dried, leathern-hided race. The red people, whether of the Rocky mountains or of the Missis- sippi, belonged to the aristocracy of the long pipes. Let us hope that they have not degenerated, and become followers of the customs of the barbarian ultra-marines.
Turn over the leaves of “Westward Ho !” until you reach the end of the seventh chapter, and then read of Salvation Yeo and his fiery repu- tation, and his eulogium — “ for when all things were made, none was made better than this; to be a lone man’s companion, a bachelor’s friend, a hun- gry man’s food, a sad man’s cordial, a wakeful man’s sleep, and a chilly man’s fire, sir ; while, for stanching of wounds, purging of rheum, and settling of the stomach, there’s no herb like unto it under the canopy of heaven.” The truth of which eulogium Amyas testeth in after years. But, “ mark in the meanwhile,” says one of the veracious chroniclers from whom I draw these facts, writing seemingly in the palmy days of good Queen Anne and “ not having (as he says) before his eyes the fear of that misocapnic Solomon James I. or of any other lyin°- Stuart,” “ that not to South Devon, but to North* not to Sir Walter Raleigh, but to Sir Amyas Leigh ; not to the banks of the Dart, but to the banks of iorndge, does Europe owe the dayspring ot the latter age, that age of smoke which shall endure and thrive when the age of brass shall have vanished, like those of iron and of gold, for whereas tr. Lane is said to have brought home that divine weed (as Spenser well names it), from Virginia in ie year 1584, it is hereby indisputable that full Tn!irra earlier> by UUge of Mford in the hermit? (whlch a11 true smokers shall
• i C. tci T18^ as a hallowed spot and point of pilgrimage) first twinkled that fiery beacon and
50
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
beneficent loadstar of Bidefordian commerce, to spread hereafter from port to port, and peak to peak, like the watch-fires which proclaimed the coming of the Armada and the fall of Troy, even to the shores of the Bosphorus, the peaks of the Caucasus, and the farthest isles of the Malayan sea; while Bideford, metropolis of tobacco, saw her Pool choked up with Virginian traders, and the pavement of her Bridgeland Street groaning beneath the savoury bales of roll Trinidado, leaf, ) and pudding ; and the grave burghers, bolstered } and blocked out of their own houses by the scarce less savoury stockfish casks which filled, cellar, parlour, and attic, were fain to sit outside the ; door, a silver pipe in every strong right hand, and • each left hand chinking cheerfully the doubloons deep lodged in the auriferous caverns of their trunkhose ; while in those fairy rings of fragrant • mist, which circled round their contemplative I brows, flitted most pleasant visions of Wiltshire f farmers jogging into Sherborne fair, their heaviest I shillings in their pockets to buy (unless old Aubrey lies) the lotus leaf of Porridge for its ' weight in silver, and draw from thence, after the I example of the Caciques of Dariena, supplies of f inspiration much needed then, as now, in those | Gothamite regions. And yet did these improve, ; as Englishmen, upon the method of those heathen savages; for the latter (so Salvation Yeo reported ■ as a truth, and Dampier’s surgeon, Mr Wafer, 1 after him), when they will deliberate of war or policy, sit round in the hut of the chief ; where being placed, enter to them a small boy with a cigarro of the bigness of a rolling pm, and pulls the smoke thereof into the face of each warrior, from the eldest to the youngest; while they, putting their hand funnel-wise round their mouths, draw into the sinuosities of the brain, that more
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
51
than Delphic vapour of prophecy ; which boy pre- sently falls down in a swoon, and being dragged out by the heels and laid by to sober, enter another to puff at the sacred cigarro, till he is dragged out likewise, and so on till the tobacco is finished, and the seed of wisdom has sprouted in every soul into the tree of meditation, bearing the flowers of eloquence, and, in due time, the fruit of valiant action.” And with this quaint fact, narrated in the bombastic style of chronicles, close th the seventh chapter of the voyages and adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh, under the style and title already mentioned, and after which digression the course of our narrative proceedeth as before.
The inhabitants of Yemen smoke their well- loved dschihschi pipes, with long stems passed through water, that the smoke may come cold to the mouth ; and which, when a few inveterate smokers meet together, keep up a boiling and bubbling noise, not unlike a distant corps of drummers in full performance.
. ^ke Austrian dominions, the lovers of the pipe may be found amongst all classes of the community. Kohl writes, that after taking two or three pipes of tobacco with the pasha at New Ursova, he went into the market-place, where he round several merchants who invited him to sit own, and again he was presented with a pipe.
f/om this place he went to a mosque, calling in at a schoo1 on hig way._«The little Turkish
dents were making a most heathenish noise,
JZ c°ntrasted arausing1.7 with the quiet and
. , demeanour of their teacher, who lay
Sne nnd XXVT C\bench’ where he sraoked kis to look otSatl He afterwards went to
saw ') Inf iie dedications, and here and there
Pipe' in thT Vrith hLs musket in one hand and PTe m the other. « Twenty-five soldiers were
e 2
52
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
seen smoking under a shed, and on the ground lay a number of shells or hollow halls, which they assured us wore filled with powder and other combustibles, yet the soldiers smoked among them unconcernedly, and allowed us to do the same/’ A gentleman from Constantinople told him that he had seen worse instances of careless- ness, in Asia Minor. He had there been one day in the tents of a pasha, where some wet powder was drying and being made into cartridges, and the men engaged in the work were smoking all the ■while.
In the “ Stettin Gazette,” lately appeared a notification that the Prussian clergy had privately been requested by the higher authorities to abstain from smoking in public. We are not accustomed to it, and should certainly think it odd to see clergymen perambulating the streets with shoit I pipes in their mouths.
In all parts of the Sultan’s dominions, the pipe or narghile has a stem generally flexible, about six feet in length; and at this the owner wilil suck for hours. You may see a man travelling, mounted aloft on a tall camel, with his body oscillating to and fro like a sailor’s when he I rows, but still that man has his two yards ot pipe before him. lrou may see two men caulking a ship’s side as she lies careened near the shore. Up to their waists in water, they act up to t he principle of division of labour ; for one will smoke as the other plies the hammer, and then the worker takes his turn at the narghile. Arabs sitting at work, fix their pipes m the sand In the potteries both hands must be employed— how, then, can the potter smoke? Necessity is the mother of invention. One end of the pipe is sus- pended by a cord from the ceiling, the other is in the potter’s mouth.
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
53
In smoking, Lane informs us, the people of Egypt and other countries of the East draw in their breath freely, so that much of the smoke descends into the lungs ; and the terms which they use to express “ smoking tobacco,” signify “ drinking smoke,” or “ drinking tobacco for the same word signifies both smoke and tobacco. Few of them spit while smoking ■ he had seldom seen them do so.
It was something like drinking of smoke that Napoleon accomplished in his unsuccessful smoking campaign. He once took a fancy to try to smoke. Everything was prepared for him, and his Majesty took the amber mouth-piece of the narghile be- tween his bps; he contented himself with open- ing and shutting his mouth alternately, without in the least drawing his breath. “ The devil,” he re- plied—why, there’s no result ! ” It was shewn that he made the attempt badly, and the proper method practically exhibited to him. At last he drew in a mouthful, when the smoke — which he had dis- covered the means of drawing in, hut knew not to, exPel— found its way into his throat, and thence by Ins nose, almost blinding him. As soon as he recovered breath, he cried out— “ Awav with
it ! What an abomination ! Oh ! the lion my
stomach turns ! ” In fact, the annoyance continued lor an hour, and he renounced for ever a habit
W ahu 1G was ^ on^ amuse sluggards.
Although Napoleon managed to fail, thousands less mighty have managed to succeed. There is a curious kind of legend mentioned in Brands Antiquities, by way of accounting for the frequent use and continuance of taking tobacco, for the eracity of which he declares that he will not Amp " ' ^Gn the Christians first discovered
flip nCai t evil was afraid of losing his hold of the people there by the appearance of Christianity.
54
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
He is reported to have told some Indians of his acquaintance, that he had found a way to he re- venged on the Christians for beating up his quarters, for he would teach them to take tobacco, to which, when they had once tasted it, they should become perpetual slaves.”
y Without venturing to authenticate this strange story, in the moral of which Napoleon would have concurred — with a mental reservation in favour of snuff — after the above defeat, let us console tobacco lovers, that whilst the success of the first temptation closed the gates of Paradise, the success of the second opens them again.
The following from an old collection of epigrams is, in every respect, worthy of the theme.
“ All dainty meats I do defie,
Which feed men fat as swine ;
He is a frugal man indeed That on a leaf can dine.
He needs no napkin for his hands His fingers’ ends to wipe,
That keeps his kitchen in a box,
And roast meat in a pipe.”
In Hamburg, 40,000 cigars are smoked daily in a population scarcely amounting to 45,000 adult males. And in London, the consumption must be considerable to furnish, from the profits of retail- ing, a living to 1566 tobacconists. In England, we may presume that the largest smoker of tobacco must be the Queen, since an immense kiln at the docks, called the Queen’s pipe, is occasionally lighted and primed with hundredweights of tobacco, sea damaged or otherwise spoiled, at the same time blowing a cloud
“ Wrhich Turks might envy, Africans adore.”
The total number of cigars consumed in France in 1857 is stated to have been 523,636,000 ; and
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
55
the total revenue of the French Government from the tobacco monopoly is estimated at £7,320,000 annually. In Russia the revenue is £7,200,000 annually ; and in Austria near £3,000,000. These are large sums to pay for the privilege of puffing.
The Buffalo Democracy estimates the annual consumption of tobacco at 4,000,000,000 of pounds. This is all smoked, chewed, or snuffed. Suppose it all made into cigars 100 to the pound, it would produce 400,000,000,000 of cigars. These cigars5 at the usual length, four inches, if joined together, would form one continuous cigar 25,253,520 miles long, which would encircle the earth more than 1000 times. Cut up into equal pieces, 250,000 miles in length, there would be over 1000 cigars which would extend from the centre of the earth to the centre of the moon. Put these cigars into boxes 10 inches long, 4 inches wide, and 3 inches high, 100 to the box, and it would require 4,000,000,000 boxes to contain them. Pile up these boxes in a solid mass, and they would occupy a space of 294,444,444 cubic feet ; if piled up 20 feet high, they would cover a farm of 338 acres ; and if laid side by side, the boxes would cover nearly 20,000 acres. Allowing this tobacco, in its unmanufactured state, to cost sixpence a pound and we have 100,000,000 pounds sterling expended yearly upon tins weed ; at least one-and-a-half times as much more is required to manufacture it into a marketable form, and dispose of it to the consumer. At the very lowest estimate, then, the human family expend every year £250,000,000 in the gratified won ot an acquired habit, or a crown for every man woman, and child upon the earth. This sum the writer calculates, would build 2 railroads round the
from .t\C,°,8t ?-f f >°?° I'cr « 16 railroads
100 000 f pAt untlC to -the 1Jacific- If would build 100,000 churches, costing £2,500 each, or 1,000,000
56 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
dwellings costing £25 each (rather small !) It would employ 1,000,000 of preachers and 1,000,000 of teachers, giving each a salary of £125. It would support 3.( millions of young men at college, allow- ing to each £75 a year for expenses.
What a cloud the “ human family ” would blow if they had each his share of the 4,000,000,000 pounds dealt out to him in cigars on the morning of the 25th of December, in the year of our Lord, 1860. One feels dubious as to the number who would refuse to take their quota, if there were nothing to pay.
Dr. Dwight Baldwin states, that in 1851, the city of New York spent 3,650,000 dollars for cigars alone, while it only spent 3,102,500 dollars for bread. The Grand Erie Canal, 364 miles long, the longest in the world, with its eighteen aqueducts, and eighty-four locks, was made in six years, at a cost of 7,000,000 dollars. The cigar hill in the city of New York would have paid the whole in two years.
The number of cigar manufactories in America is 1,400, and the number of hands employed in them 7,000 and upwards. The total estimated weekly produce of these manufactories is 1 1 -V millions, and the yearly 840 millions. At 7 dollars per 1,000, these would be worth 5 million dollars, and adding 50 per cent, for jobber and retailer, the total cost to consumers would be 7^ million dollars— add to this the sum paid for imported cigars, 6 million dollars, and we ha\c 1 3 1 million dollars, the value of cigars consumed yearly in the United States, without adding profit to the im- ported cigars ; so that, including the amount ex- pended in tobacco for smoking and chewing, an in snuff, the annual cost ol the tobacco consumed vearly, is not less than 30 million dollars or £6,000,000. This is but little more than is
THE CABINET OF CLOUDLAND.
57
realized annually in Great Britain by the excise duty alone on the tobacco consumed at home ; but it must be remembered, that in America tobacco is free of the duty of three shillings and twopence per pound, and free of charges for an Atlantic passage, so that the tobacco represented by 6 millions there, would be represented here by at least six times that amount.
_ Cloudland costs something to keep up its dig- nity after all, but beauty is seductive, and so is tobacco.
Yes! St. John (Percy, we mean — not “the Divine”), there must be “magic in the cigar.” Then, to the sailor, on the wide and tossing ocean, what consolation is there, save in his old pipe ? While smoking his inch and a half of clay, black and polished, his. Susan or his Mary becomes manifest before him, he sees her, holds converse with her spirit— in the red glare from the ebony bowl, as he walks the deck at night, or squats on the windlass, are reflected the bright sparkling eyes of his sweetheart. The Irish fruit-woman^ the Jai vie without a fare, the policeman on a quiet beat, the soldier at his ease, all bow to the mystic power of tobacco* — all acknowledge the infatua- tions of Cloudland.
* Bentley’s Magazine.
CHAPTER Y.
PIPEOLOGY.
“ It was his constant companion and solace. IVas he gay, he smoked —was he sad, he smoked— his pipe was never out of his mouth— it was a part of his physiognomy ; without it his best friends would not know him. Take away his pipe— you might as well take away his nose."
. — Knickerbocker’s New York.
Semele, in a deatli by fire, became a martyr to love. Thus Virginia suffers herself to he burnt for the good of the world. From the ashes of the old Phoenix the young Phoenix was horn. From the smoke of the Havana spring new visions, and eloquent delights. As the altars of the gods re- ceived honour from men, and the censers from whence ascended the burning incense were sacred to the deities, wherefore should not the pipe receive honour, as well as the man who uses it, or the odorous weed consumed within it. An enthusiast writes of it thus— “ Philosophers have • drawn their best similes from their pipes. How could they have done so, had their pipes first been t drawn from them ? We see the smoke go up- • wards — we think of life ; we see the smoke- wreath fade away— we remember the morning cloud. Our pipe breaks— we mourn the fragility of earthly pleasures We smoke it to an end, and tapping : out the ashes, remember that ‘Dust we are, and’, unto dust we shall return.’ If we are in love, we. garnish a whole sonnet with images drawn from smoking, and first tiff our pipe, and then tune it.
PIPEOLOGY.
59
That spark kindles like her eye, is ruddy as her lip; this slender clay, as white as her hand, and slim as her waist ; till her raven hair grows grey as these ashes, I will love her. This perfume is not sweeter than her breath, though sweeter than all else. The odour ascends me into the brain, fills it full of all fiery delectable shapes, which delivered over to the tongue, which is the birth become delectable wit.”
The instruments by which the <c universal weed” is consumed, are almost as variable in form and material as the nations indulging in their use. The pipe of Holland is of porcelain, and that of our own island of unglazed clay. These latter are made in large quantities, both at home and abroad* One factory at St. Omer employs 450 work-people, and produces annually 100,000 gross, or nearly fifteen millions of pipes ; and another factory at the same place employs 850 work-people, and produces 200,000 gross, or nearly thirty mil- lions of pipes, consuming nearly eight thousand tons of clay in their manufacture. The quantity of pipes used annually in London is estimated at 364,000 gross, or 52,416,000 pipes ; it requires 300 men, each man making 20 gross four dozen per week, for one year, to make them ; the cost of winch is £40,950. The average length of these pipes is twelve and. a half inches; and if laid down in a horizontal position, end to end together, they would reach to the extent of 10,340 miles, 1,600 yauls ; if they were piled one above another per- pendicularly they would reach 135,138 times as g as bt. Pauls; they would weigh 1,137 tons,
indebted to' ®*>™e tobacco P'P® ot <%. the Dutch are
rof,0,Owl,!ch- Mr-
of the Gouda Tine Work ' m 1^?8’states tliat the master Principal ** -
60 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
10 cwts., and it would require 104 tons, 9 cwts., 32 lbs. of tobacco to fill them. In 1857 we im- ported clay pipes to the value of £7,614, which cannot be short of 121,000 gross, or seventeen and a half millions. But even with us, pipes were not always of clay. The earliest pipes used in Britain are stated to have been made from a walnut-shell and a straw. Dr. Boyle describes a very primitive kind of clay pipe used by some of the natives of India — it is presumed only in cases of necessity. “ The amateur makes two holes, one longer than the other, with a piece of stick in a clay soil, in- clining the stick so that they may meet ; into the shorter hole he places the tobacco, and applies his mouth to the other, and thus, as he lies upon the around, luxuriates in the fumes of the narcotic
herb/’ j ]
Turkish pipe-bowls, or Lules, are composed of the red clay of Nish, mixed with the white earth of the Roustchouck. They are very graceful in form, and are in some cases ornamented with gild- ing. The u regular Turk” prefers a fresh bowl daily ; therefore the plain ones are resorted to on the score of economy. In Turkey and some other parts of the Orient, it is not unusual to compute distances, or rather the duration of a journey, by the numbers of pipes which might be smoked in the time necessary to accomplish it.
The pipe of the German is, almost universally, the Meerschaum, that pipe of fame so coveted by the Northern smoker. These articles are composed of a kind of magnesian earth, known to the Tar- tars of the Crimea as kef -til. Pallas erroneously supposed that this kind of earth was so denomi- nated from Caffa, and therefore the name signified “ Caffa earth.” From “ Memnski s Oriental Dic- tionary” it would appear to. be a derivation of two Turkish words which signify u foam or “froti
PIPEOLOGY.
61
of the “ earth.” The French name, ecume de mer , or “ scum of the sea,” and the Germans “ sea foam,” have doubtless an intimate relationship with this same “ keff til” of the Crimean Tartars.
_ Meerschaum earth is met with in various locali- ties in Spain, 'Greece, Crimea, and Moravia. The greatest quantity is derived from Asia Minor, it being dug principally in the peninsula of Natolia, near the town of Coniah. Before the capture of the Crimea, this earth is stated to have formed a considerable article of commerce with Constanti- nople, where it was used in the public baths to cleanse the hair of women. The first rude shape was formerly given to the pipe-bowls on the spot where the mineral was dug, by pressure in a mould ; and these rude bowls were more elegantly carved and finished at Pesth and Vienna. At the present time, the greater part of the meerschaum is ex- ported in the shape of irregular blocks ; these un- dergo a. careful manipulation^ after having been soaked in a preparation of wax and oil. After being finished, and sold at the German fairs, some of them have acquired such an exquisite tint thiough smoking, in the estimation of connoisseurs, that they have realized from £40 to £50.
Attempts have not been wanting to imitate this material, hitherto not very successfully. The large quantity of parings that are left in trimming up the bowls, has been rendered available for the manufacture of what are called “ massa bowls,” but
e) ( o not enjoy the reputation of the genuine meerschaum bowls.
is yet another mineral production, the use which Turkish smokers, at any rate, know how o appreciate. This is amber. The Turk will expend an almost fabulous sum in an amber mouth-
.u,s. nar9h^eh. Four valuable articles of this description were exhibited in the Turkish de-
62
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
partment of the Exhibition of 1851, which were worth together £1000, two of them being valued at £305 each. There is a current belief in Turkey that amber is incapable of transmitting infection ; and as it is considered a great mark of politeness to offer the pipe to a stranger, this presumed pro- perty of amber accounts in some measure for the estimation in which it is held.
The knowledge of amber extends backwards to a remote antiquity, as the Phoenicians of old fetched it from Prussia. Since that period it has been obtained there uninterruptedly, without any dimi- nution in the quantity annually collected. The greatest amount of amber is found on the coast of Prussia proper, between Konigsherg and Dantzic. From the amber-beds on the coast of Dirschkeim, extending under the sea, a storm threw up, on the 1st of January, 1848, no less than 800 pounds. The amber fishery of Prussia formerly produced to the king about 25,000 crowns per month. After a storm, the amber coasts are crowded with gatherers, large masses of amber being occasionally cast up by the waves. In digging for a well in the coal- mines near Prague, the workmen lately discovered, between the bed of gritstone which forms the roof of that mine and the first layer of coals, a bed of yellow amber, apparently of great extent. Pieces weighing from two to three pounds ha\ e been ex- tracted. There are two kinds— the terrestrial, which is dug in mines, and the marine, which is cast ashore during autumnal storms.
Opinions vary as to the origin of amber. Tacitus and others have considered it a fossil resin exhaled by certain coniferous trees, traces of which are fre- quently observed among the amber, whilst other theorists contend that it is a species of wax or lat, having undergone a slow process ot putrefaction, this latter view being based upon the fact that
PIPEOLOGY.
63
chemists are able to convert fatty or cerous sub- stances into succinic acid by artificial oxidation. One thing is, however, certain, that amber, at some period of its history, must have existed in a state of fluidity, since numerous insects, especially of the spider kind, are found imbedded in it ; and a spe- cimen has been shown enclosing the leg of a toad. Toads are in the habit of living for centuries, we are informed, cooped up in stone and rock ; but we are not aware that hitherto any of these extraordi- nary reptiles have been found buried alive in a mass of amber. Masses of amber have been found weigh- ing from 4 lbs. to 6 lbs. — more than large enough to contain a toad or two of ordinary dimensions.
F or a knowledge of the pipes of modern Egypt, we must resort for information to Mr. Lane, from whom we gather the following notes. The pipe (which is called by many names, as “shibuk,” “ood, ’ &c.) is generally between four and five feet long. Some pipes are shorter, and some of greater length. The most common kind used in Egypt is made of a kind of wood called “ garmashak.” The giealu pait of the stick is covered with silk, which is confined at each extremity by gold thread, often intertwined with coloured silks, or by a tube of gilt silver; and at the lower extremity of the covering is a tassel of silk. The covering was originally designed to be moistened with water in order to cool the pipe, and consequently the smoke by evaporation; but this is only done when the pipe is old, or not handsome. Cherrystick pipes w nch are never covered, are used by some persons’ particularly in the winter. In summer, the smoke
r? -T1 from .the cherrystick pipe as from ttc k‘„d heforc mentioned. The bowl is of baked earth, coloured red or brown. The mouthpiece is
coloured1 °VW° ^ “°re pieCCS °f °Pa(lue> Hght- d amber, mterjoincd by ornaments of en-
04 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
amelled gold, agate, jasper, carnelion, or some other precious substance. This is the most costly part of the pipe. Those in ordinary use by persons of the middle classes cost from £1 to £3 sterling. A wooden tube passes through it; this is often changed, as it becomes foul from the oil of the tobacco. The pipe also requires to be cleaned very often, which is done with tow, by means of a long wire. Many poor men in Cairo gain a livelihood by cleaning pipes. Some of the Egyptians use the Persian pipe, in which the smoke passes through water. The pipe of this kind most commonly used by persons of the higher classes is called “ nargeeleh,” because the vessel that contains the water is the shell of a cocoa-nut, of which “ nar- geeleh” is an Arabic name. Another kind which has a glass vase, is called “ sheesheh,” from the Persian word signifying “ glass.” Each has a very long, flexible tube.
A kind of pipe commonly called “ gozeh,” which is similar to the nargeeleh, excepting that it has a short cane tube, instead of the snake, and no stand. This is used by men of the lowest class for smoking both the “ turabak " or Persian tobacco, and" the narcotic hemp.
The Zoolus of Southern Africa have a kind of pipe or smoking horn called “ Egoodu,' which is constructed on a similar principle to the Persian pipe. The herb is placed at the end of a reed in- troduced into the side of an oxhorn, which is filled with water, and the mouth applied to the upper or wide part of the horn, the smoke passing down the reed and through the water.
The Delagoaus of Eastern Africa smoke the “ hubble-bubble,” a similar instrument, having the upper part of the horn closed, excepting a small orifice in the centre of the covering through which the smoke is inhaled.
riPEOLOC Y.
65
The Kaffirs form pipe bowls from a black, and also from a green stone ; they are in shape similar to the Dutch pipes, and without ornament. The negroes of. Western Africa have pipes of a reddish earth, some of them of very uncouth and singular forms, others close imitations of European pipe bowls. One kind of pipe consists of two bowls placed side by side upon a single stem. Old Indian pipes have been found in America, also fashioned out of green stone.
The natives of the South-West coast of Africa, near Elizabeth’s Bay, use pipes in the shape of a cigar tube formed of a mottled green or white mineral of the magnesian family, externally carved or roughly ornamented.
. Sailors, when on a voyage, are often in difficui- ties for the want of pipes. Under such circum- stances, numerous contrivances have at different times been resorted to to remedy the defect ; such as pipes cast out of old lead, or cut out of wood.
he sailors. belonging to H.M.S. Samarcmg bavin o- lost their pipes in the Sarawak river, set to, and in a very, little while, manufactured excellent pipes li’om different sized internodes of the bamboos that grew around them. In India, simple pipes are used composed of two pieces of bamboo, one for
the bowl cut close to a knot, and a smaller one for the tube.
the aborigines of British Guiana use a pipe, or rather a tube, called a “ Winna.” It resembles a cneroot m outward appearance, but is hollow, so as to contain the tobacco. It is said to be made from c nnd of the fruit of the manicot palm, growing on the river Berbice. Forasmuch as it pleaseth us • r™w fashions from nations barbarous as well
“Winnf"^ a v°rm °f itllbe much resembling the
nist shn™ nbeei1 fatle and sold in the tobacco- nist shops of the metropolis of old England.
F
66
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
Among the Bashee group, and particularly on the island of Ibayat, the natives form very elegant and commodious pipes from different species of shells, the columella and septa of the convolutions being broken down, and a short ebony stem inserted into a hole at the apex of the spire. These are more generally formed of the shells known as the Bishop’s mitre (Mitra episcopate) and the Pope’s mitre (Mitra papalis )._ Species of Terebra and Turbo are also converted into pipes.
In China, where M. Bondot calculates that there are not less’ than 100 millions, and Abbe Hue 300 millions of smokers, pipes are made in immense numbers. Of tbese there ure three kinds; the water pipe, the straight pipe, and the opium pipe. Chinese pipes, and indeed those of all the Indc- Chinese races, including the Tartars, Chinese, Koreans, and Japanese, are provided with a smaU metallic bowl, and usually a long bamboo stem ; for with persons who are in the habit of smoking, at short intervals, all day long, a large bowl would be inadmissable. By inhaling but a pinch Oi tobacco on one occasion, they extend the influence of a larger pipe over a greater space ot time. In such cases they suffer no inconvenience from the nature of the material of which the bowl is com- posed. Nations that smoke larger pipes adopt some other substance, as metal would become^ too hot ; hence we have pipes of “ Samian ware m Turkey, “ Meerschaum” in Germany and Clay iu England and other places. My Uncle Toby would have burnt liis Augers with a Chinese pipe of nickel silver many a tune and often - and it would have required a large amount of logic to have induced Doctor Kiccabocca to have exchanged, his companion (his pipe, not his umbrella) for a bowl of Japanese manufacture. ,,
Isaac Browne thought, a century ago, that there
PIPEOLOGY.
67
was something in a pipe worth writing about, or he had never given us the following
“ODE TO A TOBACCO PIPE.
“ Little tube of mighty power, Charmer of an idle hour,
Object of my warm desire,
Lip of wax, and eye of fire ;
And thy snowy taper waist,
With thy finger gently braced ■
And thy pretty swelling crest,
With thy little stopper prest ;
And the sweetest bliss of blisses Breathing from thy balmy kisses. Happy thrice, and thrice again, Happiest he of happy men ;
Who, when again the night returns When again the taper burns,
When again the cricket’s gay (Little cricket full of play),
Can afford his tube to feed’
With the fragrant Indian weed • Pleasure for a nose divine,
Incense of the god of wine.
Happy thrice, and thrice again Happiest he of happy men.”
, 7 u'gmia’s native country, the nine sHpPr
closer to a man than his boot An^neS s no more furnished without his
To thi °T 18 (U1'".ished "iflxwt a looking glass’ nil ? n ?tlVe Indlan’ ifc supplies an important
We If w°°mTet •hlSt,tre?tl' of Peace — his chal- rufi- u War‘ 18 ^le instrument of a solemn
potest comehofZ rltpea0f Z ,T *° the
every warrior ..V Con1tment, which has visited
stem the irrevoenhl paS!!£d ?rouSh its reddened ’ urevocable oath of war and desolation f 2
68
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
And here, also, the peace breathing calumet was horn and fringed with the eagle s quills, which has shed its thrilling fumes over the land, and soothed the fury of the relentless savage lhe Great Spirit, at an ancient period, hem called to- gether the Indian warriors, and standing on the precipice of the red-pipe stone rock, broke from its wall a piece, and made a huge pipe, by turning it in his hand, which he smoked over them, and to the north, the south, the east, and the west; and told them that this stone was red — that it was their flesh— that they must use it for their pipes of peace, that it belonged to them all, and that the war club, and the scalping knife must not be raised on its ground. At the last wlnft of his nine, his head went into a great cloud, and the whole surface of the rock, for several miles, was melted and glazed. Two great ovens were opened beneath, and two women, guardian spirits ot the place, entered them in a blaze of fire, and they are heard there yet, answering to the invocations ot the priests or medicine men, who consult them when they are visitors to this sacred place.
“ Prom the red stone of the quarry With his hand he broke a fragment, Moulded it into a pipe head,
Shaped and fashioned it with figures. From the margin of the river Took a long reed for a pipe stem.
With its dark green leaves upon it ; Filled the pipe with hark of willow ; With the bark of the red willow ; Breathed upon the neighbouring forest, Made its great boughs chafe together, Till in flame they burst, and kindled ; And erect upon the mountains,
Gitche Manito, the mighty,
Smoked the calumet, the Peace 1 ipe, As a signal to the nations,” &c.
* Catlin's North American Indians, vol. ii., PP- 160.
PIPEOLOGY.
69
The tribes of the Missouri make their pipes of a kind of stone called Catlinite, from the red pipe stone quarries upon the head waters of that river, the colour of which is brick red. These stones, when first taken out of the quarry are soft, and easily worked with a knife, but on exposure to the air become hard and take a good polish. The pipes of the Rocky Mountain Indians are some of them wrought with much labour and ingenuity of an argillaceous stone of a very fine texture, found at the north, of Queen Charlotte’s Island. This stone is of a blue black colour, and in character similar to the red earth of the Missouri quarry.
The Calumet or “ pipe of peace” of the Sioux Indians is thus described by Irving. “The bowl was of a species of red stone resembling porphyry, the stem was six feet in length, decorated with tufts of horse hair dyed red. The pipe bearer stepped within the circle, lighted the pipe, held it towards the sun, then towards the different points of the compass, after which he handed it to the principal chief. The latter smoked a few whiffs then, holding the head of the pipe in his hand, oifered the other end to their visitor, and to each one successively in the circle. When all had smoked, it was considered that an assurance of good faith and amity had been interchanged.” The use of the Uspogan or Calumet among the -Lythinyuwak,. appears not to have been an original practice of the Tinne, but was introduced p,. tobacco by Europeans; while among the
nppeways, the plant has been grown from the noost ancient times.
Among the most uncultivated and uncivilized of „• J'?ns’ W InPe is an object upon which is exer-
sed alt their ingenuity, and in the decoration of
almoi1piC0“ren+ti!ate(i a11 their taste- 0ne might almost classify the races of the world by means of
70 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
a good collection of their pipes, and not stray very far from the order resulting from more scientific processes.
In the East, there is existing an almost incessant habit of smoking ; and the pipe is the prelude of all official acts, of all conversations, and of all social relations. The Oriental seizes his pipe in the morning, and scarcely relinquishes it till he goes to bed. Here there is generally a special functionary — the pipe-hearer — as an appendages to all officials. When the Sultan goes abroad, his pipe-bearer is with him. In families of respec- tability, the care of the pipes is the exclusive attribute of one or more servants, who occupy the highest grade of the domestic establishment ; and thus dignity is given to the pipe, even in a country where less dignity is allowed to the fairer portion of the community than in more highly cultivated countries.
In the Museum of the Botanic Gardens at Hew, are pipes and stems carved out of boxwood, as used in Sweden; also pipe-bowls of pine and other woods made by the native Indians near Sitka in North-West America, and brought home from. a late expedition. The latter are rude, but quite equal in elegance to many which adorn the win- dows of fancy tobacconists and cigar divans in this metropolis of the civilized world.
From a schism in tobacco-pipes, Knickerbocker dates the rise of parties in the Niew Nederlandts. « The rich and self-important burghers, who had made their fortunes, and could afford' to be lazy, adhered to the ancient fashion, and formed a kind of aristocracy, known as the Long-pipes while the lower order, adopting the reform of William Kieft, as more convenient in their handicraft employ- ments, were branded with the plebeian name of Short-pipes” Who may be considered as the
PIPEOLOGY.
71
founder of the English Short-pipe school, is more difficult to determine ; it is nevertheless, of late years, a very popular one, and considerably out- numbers the aristocracy of Long-pipes. The variety of these instruments is almost infinite. There are all kinds of short clays, cutties, St. Omer, Gambier, meerschaum washed, coloured clay, and fancy clay of all shapes, grotesque, uncouth, stupid, and in some instances graceful. Pipes also of wood, of black ebony, green ebony, brier-root — whatever that may be — cherry-root, tulip-wood, rosewood, &c. Glass pipes, with reservoirs and without, smokers’ friends, and, if we may judge from their size, tobacconists’ friends ; meerschaum bowls, massa bowls, porcelain bowls, clay bowls, of uncouth and monstrous heads, with eyes of glass and enamelled teeth, together with short stems and mounts for broken clays. Add to these, one knows not how many kinds of tobacco-pots, from a smiling damsel in all the glories of crinoline, to the dissevered head of Poor Dog Tray. The windows of retail tobacconists now-a-days more resemble a toy-shop, or a fancy stall from an arcade or bazaar, than the sober-looking windows of a retailer halt a century ago. Mr. Frank Fowler informs us that the same tastes have migrated to Australia. ^ “ The cutty is of all shapes, sizes, and shades. _ Some are negro heads, set with rows of very white teeth; some are mermaids, showing their more presentable halves up the front of the bowls, and stowing away their weedy extremities under the stems. Some are Turkish caps, some are Russian skulls, some are houris, some are hrn presses of the French, some are Margaret t/atchpoles, some arc as small as my lady’s thimble others as large as an old Chelsea tea-cup. Every- ody has one, from the little pinafore schoolboy *ho has renounced his hardbake for his Hard ham’ s’
72
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
to the old veteran who came out with the second hatch of convicts, and remembers George Barring- ton’s prologue. Clergymen get up their sermons over the pipe; members of parliament walk the verandah of the Sydney House of Legislature, with the black bowl gleaming between their teeth One of the metropolitan representatives was seriously ill just before I left, from having smoked forty pipes of Latakia at one sitting. A cutty bowl, like a Creole’s eye, is most prized when blackest. Some smokers wrap the bowls reverently in leather during the process' of colouring ; others buy them ready stained, and get (I suppose) the reputation of accomplished whiffers at once. Every young swell glories in his cabinet of dirty clay pipes. A friend of mine used to call a box of the little black things Iris £ Stowe collection.’ Tobacco, I shonld add here, is seldom sold in a cut form ; each man carries a cake about with him, like a card-case ; each boy has his stick of Cavendish, like so much candy. The cigars usually smoked are Manillas, which are as cheap and good as can be met with in any part of the world. Lola Montez, during her Australian tour, spoke well of them. What stronger puff could they have than hers ?
CHAPTER VI.
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
“ *’Ti8 most Excellent,’ said the monk. ‘ Then dome the favour ’ I replied, ‘to accept of the box and all ; and when you take a pinch out o it, sometimes recollect that it was the peace-offering of a man who once used you unkindly, but not from the heart.’ ”
Sterne’s Sentimental Jour ney.
Everybody, of course, knows all about the Fran- ciscan and his snuff-box, with which this chapter begins. Sterne narrates it in his happiest vein, and all who read it are somehow sure to remember it; Boxes are exchanged ; the traveller is left to himself. Row he moralises : “ I guard this box as I would the instrumental parts of my religion to help my mind on to something better. In truth’ 1 seldom go abroad without it ; and oft and many a,, !'nc have I called up by it the courteous spirit ot its owner to regulate my own in the iustlings of e world. They had found full employment for R aIm learned fi;om his story, till about the i. 1 1 . year of his age, when, upon some mili-
d1) services ill-requited, and meeting at the same ime with a disappointment in the tenderest of passions, he abandoned the sword and the sex gether, and took sanctuary, not so much in his convent as in himself.”
antW-W°rtd f 8nuSf” is 6tated V competent verb lnflectlon of t,ic old nortliern
before ff’ yb ich latter word was in existence long oelore the invention or knowledge of the substanc!
74
THE SEVEN SISTERS OP SLEEP.
to which it now gives its name.* In its earlier signification, it was expressive of strong inhalation through the nostrils, or descriptive of any impa- tience. Hence arose the the expressions in use in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, to “ snuff pepper” or “ take in snuff.’' Shakespeare makes a similar use of the phrase in H mry IV., in con- nection with a small box of perfume displayed by a courtier to the annoyance of Hotspur.
“ He was perfumed like a milliner ;
And, ’twixt his finger and his thumb, he held A pouncet box, which ever and anon He gave his nose, and took’t away again ;
Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff.”
In this quotation we also meet with the u pouncet box,” which seems to have been a small box having a “ pounced” or perforated cover, containing per- fumes, the scent of which escaping from the open work at the top was regarded as a preservative against contagion. From the pouncet box the perfumes were inhaled. It was probably not till a century after the introduction of tobacco, that the triturated dust was commonly in use, and there became any occasion for the snuff-box. _
Humboldt gives an account ot a curious kind of snuff, as well as an extraordinary method ot in- haling it, which came under his notice while travelling in South America. “The Ottomacs he days, “ throw themselves into a peculiar state ot intoxication, we might say ot madness, by the use of the powder of niopo. They gather the long pods of an acacia (made known by him under the name of Acacia niopo), cut them into pieces moisten them, and cause them to ferment. When tne
* Tooke says “ Snufv is the past participle of to sniff, that which is sniffed .”
SNUFFING AND SNEESHIN.
75
softened seeds begin to grow black, they are kneaded like paste, mixed with some flour of cas- sava. and lime procured from the shell of a helix (snail), and the whole mass is exposed to a very brisk fire, on a gridiron made of hard wood. The hardened . paste takes the form of small cakes. When it is to be used,, it is reduced to a fine pow- der, and placed on a dish, five or six inches wide. The. Ottomac holds this dish; which has a handle m his right hand, while he inhales the niopo by the nose, through the forked bone of a bird, the two extremities of which are applied to the5 nos- trils. This bone, without which the Ottomac believes that he could, not take this kind of snuff is seven inches long; it appears to be the leg bone ot a large species of plover. The niopo is so stimu- lating, that the smallest portions of it produce violent sneenugm those who are not accustomed to its use 55 ather Gum ill a says, “ this diabolical powder of the Uttomacs, furnished by an aborescent tobacco plant intoxicates them through the nostrils, deprives them ot. reason for some hours, and renders them furious m battle.”
A custom analagous to this, La Condamine ob- served among the natives of the Upper Maranon.
rnrf °™aguas a tnhe wbose name is intimately onnected with the expeditions in search of El
hav&> hlf® tbe Ottomacs, a dish, and the
whiT I00® °f a bird’ and a P°wder called cunwa, which , they convey to their nostrils by means of
^ ri1?anner identical with that of the Otto-
Pr°Wde- is als° obtained from the
if nn+ fho d °f aCaCia’ apparently closely allied to, n not the same as the niopo.
and Omilar ins,trum™t the bone of the Ottomacs usein?rgUaS- ilas/ ready been refen'e<l to as in
Z mfcU’ “““S trough the nostrils nioke of burning tobacco leaves.
76
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
The method of taking snuff in Iceland is de- scribed by Made. Pfeiffer as differing from the methods above detailed, but equally singular. Most of the peasants, and many of the priests, have no proper snuff-box, but only a box made of bone, and shaped like a powder flask. When they take snuff, they throw back the head, insert the point of the flask in the nose, and shake a dose of snuff in it. They then offer it to their neighbour, who repeats the performance, passes it to his, and thus it goes the round, until it reaches its owner again. Had this been the custom in the days of the “ Eape of the Lock,” Belinda had not so readily sub- dued the baron, as with one finger and a thumb — “ Just where the breath of life his nostrils drew,
A charge of snuff the wily virgin threw ;
The gnomes direct, to every atom just,
The pungent grains of titillating dust.
Sudden, with starting tears each eye o’erflows,
And the high dome re-echoes to his nose.”
The Zoolus of Southern Africa use a small gourd to carry their snuff, and a small ivory spoon with which to ladle out the dust. We remember many years ago an elderly gentleman who practised on the Zoolu plan, his snuff was carried loose in his waistcoat pocket, whence it was conveyed to his nose by means of a small silver spoon, which was always at hand for the purpose.
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
77
As early as the beginning of the reign of James I., a “ taker ol tobacco” was furnished with an apparatus resembling that of a modern Scotch mull, when supplied with all the necessary implements. In 1609, Dekker, in his “Gull’s Horn Book, says — “ Before the meat come smoking to the hoard, our gallant must draw out his tobacco-box, the ladle for the cold snuff into the nostril, the tongs and priming iron; all which artillery may he of gold or silver, if he can reach the price of it.” In 1646, Howell describes the apparatus and practice of snuff taking as quite common in other countries ; since, he says — “ The Spaniards and Irish take tobacco most in powder or smutchin, and it mightily refreshes the brain ■ and I believe there’s as much taken this way in Ireland, as there is in pipes in England. One shall commonly see the serving maid upon the washing block, and the swain upon the plough- share when they are tired of their labour, take oih their boxes of smutchin, and draw it into their nostrils with a quill, and it will beget new
spirits m them with a fresh vigour to fall to their work again.”
The word printed “smutchin” by Howell, is stated to be more accurately “sneeshin,” a vulvar snuff winch causes sneezing; and hence • b,n1ees“m miH (sometimes corrupted into “mull”') is the Scottish name for snuff-box. Dr. Jameson’s Etymological Dictionary may be considered as an authority m these matters ; and from it we learn
snuff WW°rd “T11” iS Vulgar name for a snuti-box, especially one of a cylindrical form or
resembling an inverted cone/ No other name
s formerly in use in Scotland ; and the reason ssigned for it is, that when tobacco was first
have^nuff ^ c?UIltrJ’ those who wished to snuff, were accustomed to toast the tobacco
78
THE SEVEN SISTERS OP SLEEP.
leaves before the fire, and then bruise them with a piece of wood in the box, which was thence called a “ mill,” because the snuff was ground in it. From all this, it is easy to perceive how a ram’s horn, from its conical shape, became one of the primitive forms of the Scottish snuff-box, although latterly it is often one of the most costly and luxurious.
In confirmation of the latter remark, it is only necessary to refer to an example in the Exhibition of 1851. Mr. W. Baird of Glasgow, exhibited a ram’s head beautifully mounted, as a snuff-box and cigar case. When alive, he must have been a noble sheep, for the circular horns measured no less than 3 feet 4 inches from root to tip. The cigar case was beautifully mounted, having on the top a splendid Scotch amethyst, surmounted with thistle wreaths in gold and silver, and set out with many fine cairngorms and small amethysts. The snuff-box cavity, occupied the centre of the fore- head, the lid surmounted by a splendid cairngorm, and clustered with gold and silver wreaths and small precious stones. In fact, the head presented a perfect flourish of the most beautiful and grace- fully disposed ornaments, and altogether the article was most unique. Attached thereto was a fine ivory hammer and silver spoon, pricker and rake, with a silver mounted hare’s foot. It ran on ivory castors upon a rosewood platform, surmounted by a glass shade. There were not less than nine hun- dred separate pieces of precious stones and metals used in the construction of this ornate article.
Down to the middle of the eighteenth century, the “sneeshin horn,” with spoon and hare’s foot attached to it by chains, appears to have been regarded as so completely a national charac- teristic, that when Baddeley played Gibby in “ The Wonder,” with Garrick, he came on the stage with such an apparatus.
SPIFFING AND SNEESH1N.
79
The Mongrabins and other African races, ac- cording to Werne, are much, addicted to snuff taking. The snuff they usually carry in small oval-shaped cases made out of the fruit of the Doum palm ; these have a very small opening at one end, stopped up by a wooden peg ; and the snuff is not taken in pinches, hut shaken out on the back of the hand. Mr. Campbell, while travelling in South Africa, gave a Bushman a piece of tobacco. It was speedily converted into snuff. One of the daughters, after grinding it between two stones, mixed it with white ashes from the fire ; the mother then took a large pinch of the composition, putting the remainder into a piece of goat’s skin, among the hair, and fold in cr it up for future use.
The snuff in use in Africa is not always made from tobacco. Mr. Hutchinson states that he saw at Panda, on the western coast, snuff made of the powdered leaves of the monkey fruit tree (Adan- sonia digitate, ). dhat of the Zoolus is composed of the dried leaves of the dacca or narcotic hemp mixed with the powder of burnt aloes. Whether or not this was the kind of snuff which Mr Richardson was knocked down with in his journey across the Great Desert, we are not in a position to determine ; whatever it was, it appears to have been extremely powerful. “ A merchant,” he says offered me a pinch of snuff, and to please him I took a large pinch, pushing a portion of it up mv nostrils. Immediately I fell dizzy and sick, and m a short time vomited violently. The people stared at me with astonishment, and were terrified out of their wits, and thought I was about to give np the ghost. _ They never saw snuff before pro- uce such terrible effects. After some time I got a little better and returned home. This snuff was from Souf, and is called war (difficult). I
80
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
had been warned of it, and therefore paid richly for my folly ; indeed, the Souf snuff is extremely powerful.” Some of the strict Mahometans of Ghadames consider snuffing, as well as smoking, prohibited by their religion, and therefore do not indulge in it. The South American traveller which Mr. Lizars, the tobacco antagonist, once fell in with, was evidently not a strict Mahometan, for he first filled his nostrils with snuff, which he prevented falling out by stuffing shag tobacco after it, and this he termed “ plugging then put in each cheek a coil of pig-tail tobacco, which he named “ quidding lastly, he lit a Havannah cigar, which he put into his mouth, and thus smoked and chewed — puffing at one time the smoke of the cigar, and at another time squirting the juice from his mouth. What a phenomenon ! That gentleman should have politely thanked the South American for permitting him to view an exliibition, such as he may never have the pleasure of seeing again. And what a capital illustration ready made to his hands. It is almost equal to those elaborate calculations which are based upon the amount of time consumed in taking so many pinches of snuff during the day, and so many repetitions of the operation of blowing the nose.*
* Lord Stanhope makes the following curious estimate : — “ Every professed, inveterate, and incurable snuff-taker, at a moderate computation, takes one pinch in ten minutes. Every pinch, with the agreeable ceremony of blowing and wiping the nose, and other incidental circumstances, consumes a minute and a half. One minute and a half out of every ten, allowing sixteen hours to a snuff-taking day, amounts to two hours and twenty minutes out of every natural day, or one day out of every ten. One day out of every ten amounts to thirty-six days and a half in the year ; hence, if we suppose the practice to bo persisted in for forty years, two entire years of the snuff- taker’s life will be dedicated to tickling his nose, and two more to blowing it.” The expense of snuff, snuff-boxes, and hand-
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
81
A correspondent of the « Petersburg (Ya) Express ” says : — “ There are, perhaps, in our state 125,000 women, leaving out of the account those wfio have not cut their teeth, and those who have lost them from age. Of this number, eighty pei cent, may be safely set down as snuff-dippers. Every five of these will use a two-ounce paper of snuff per day that is to the 100,000 dippers 2,500 lbs. a day, amounting to the enormous quantity of 912,000 lbs. In this number of snuff-cuppers are included all ages, colours, and conditions. This . practice is generally prevalent m the pme districts of North Carolina, and in many parts of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, and Eastern Tennessee. It may be thus described : A female snuff-dipper takes a short stick and, wetting it, dips it into her snuff-box, and then rubs .the gathered dust all about her mouth, into the interstices of her teeth, &c., where she allows it to remain until its strength has been fully absorbed Others hold the stick thus loaded with snuff m the cheek, a la quid of tobacco, and ?iUc. 1 ,yith a decided relish, while engaged in their ordinary avocations ; while others simply fill the mouth with the snuff, and thus imitate? to all tents and purposes, the chewing propensities of nW i lU-th-e abs-e?f °f snuff, tobacco, in the
1 5? or M is invariably resorted to as a substi-
to “snuffdipping” Wi“S iS elegant' COmPaIed • y,hefm(ist uncomfortable reflection to the snuffer sunfini concerns the probability of his con- ° himself by a condition of slow poisoning,
Woceilnnr a“d t0 5 and ifc is calculated that “by a a £ h°n °f thr tim° and monG^ fchus tost to the public
debt" g b° C°nstltuted for the discharge of the national
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THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
not the result of the pure tobacco, hut its impure associates in the box. In boxes lined with very thin lead, but especially in cases where the leaden lining is thicker, and which are much used by the Paris retailers, a chemical action takes place, the result of which is to charge the snuff with sub- acetate of lead. This result was suspected by Chevalier, and has been confirmed by JBoudet of Paris, and Mayer of Berlin, by careful experiments. Mayer traces several deaths and cases of saturnine paralysis to the patient’s having taken snuff from packets, the inner envelope of which was thin sheet lead, in constant contact with the powdered weed. The cry once heard of “ death in the pot,” requires now to he exchanged for “death in the box,” and Holbein to give us a new plate of the skeleton form emerging from a packet or snuff-box containing the scented rappee. .
Late investigations have shown that no small amount of adulteration is practised with snuff, and this in some instances of a most dangerous kind. Out of forty-three samples of snuff examined by Dr. Hassell, the majority were adulterated consi- derably. Chromate of lead, oxide ot lead, and bichromate of potash, all highly poisonous, were detected. Mr. Phillips also stated to the com- mittee of adulteration, that he had . found in different samples common peat, such as is obtained from the bogs of Ireland, starch, ground wood of various kinds, especially fustic, extract of logwood, chromate of lead, bichromate of potash, and ■wmous ochreous earths. Samples of spurious snuff, it is presumed for the purpose of mixing, were found to be composed of sumach, umber, Spanish brown, and salt ; another kind was made up of ground peat, yellow ochre, lime, and sand, all ot these
being more or less scented. .
Tiie numerous varieties of snuff owe their clia-
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
83
racter principally to the peculiarity of scent and the method of preparation. The perfumes used are either the essential oil of bergamot or otto of roses, and in some cases powdered orris root or Tonquin beans. The powdered leaves of the sweet-scented woodruff and the fragrant melilot have been alluded to as used for the same purpose, also the dried leaves of some species of orchis ( Orchis fusca, cfc.J
As a substitute for snuff, either in preference or in cases where tobacco snuff could not be readily obtained, different vegetable productions have come into use. In India the powdered rusty leaves of a species of rhododendron (R : ccimpanulatum), and in the United States the brown dust found adhering to the petioles of several species of kalmia and rhododendron, all of which possess narcotic properties, are used for this purpose. The pow- deied leaves of asarabacca have been named as the base of some kind of cephalic snuff. “ Grim- stone’s eye snuff” has long enjoyed a certain amount of popularity, although, it does not con- tain a particle ot tobacco, but is composed mainly ot such harmless ingredients as powdered orris root, savory, rosemary, and lavender.
But to return to the subject of deleterious adulteration, we find in Dr. Hassell’s “Adultera- tions detected in Food and Medicine” several pages occupied with this really important subject.
. ust comes the narration of a case of slow poison- ing, on the authority of Professor Erichsen bv means of snuff containing as an adulteration D2
RfV <Ue °1 Then folloWB ««»
Ji. nosbioke, of injuries sustained from snuff containing lead. These are followed by other ms anccs showing that all the combinations of
symptoms^ Ui)1|ed dangerous and disastrous y l toms, if indulged m, when mingled with
g 2
84
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
snuff, as too often, unfortunately, is the case, as an adulteration, or, as before shown, liable as a result of packing tke snuff in lcad; or keeping in boxes lined with lead. .
Advice Gratis. — Give up taking snuff , or, it you should propose slight objections to this course, then purchase leaf tobacco, and manufacture your own snuff, and having done so, keep it in a gold snuff-box, or if you have weighty reasons for pre- ferring silver, there is no objection to that metal, or even the homely horn of the Franciscan ot
Oalais
Our forefathers thought of the box, as wed as of the snuff, and sometimes paid for their thought. In the early part of the eighteenth century, fashion- able snuff-boxes had reached the highest point of luxury and variety. The Toiler of Marc 7, < >
notices several gold snuff-boxes which ‘- came out last term,” but that “ a new edition would be put out on Saturday next, which would be the only one in fashion until after Easter. The gentle- man,” continues the notice, “that gave £50 for the box set with diamonds, may show it till Sunday, provided he goes to church, but not after that time, there being one to be published on Mon .-y that will cost fourscore guineas. These costly articles, so happily satirized by Steele, aie lepie- sented as the productions of a fashionable toyman, named Charles Mather, popularly known under
the name of “ Bubble Boy. «
Nor must we forget the amber snuff-box ot
which Sir Plume, in the “ Rape of the Lock, was so justly vain ; in 1711 he “ spoke, and rapped the hnl ” In 1733, Dodsley mentions boxes made of shell mounted in gold and silver. Latterly^ have’ made tile acquaintance of several sheU snuff- boxes • some of these were made of the tiger cowry,’ mounted in silver; of a small species of
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
85
Turbo, cleaned and polished, and of harp shells, either mounted in silver or in baser metal. In different parts of the globe, tastes differ as to the materials of which snuff-boxes should be composed. A gentleman sent a piece of cannel coal from Eng- land to China, to be there carved by the ingenious Chinese into a snuff-box; this task was accom- plished, and the box was shown in the Exhibition of 1851 ; also, in the Turkish department, a snuff- box of bituminous shale. Perhaps in the new Exhibition of 1862, there may be found a similar article, carved out of Gravesend flint, by natives of the Orange Eiver Territory; or one of Suffolk coprolite, executed by rebellious sepoy women imprisoned in the hulks at Portsmouth.
In India, snuff-boxes are made of polished cocoa-nut shell, or of the seeds of Entada gigalo- bium, or purscetha ; or in Nepal, of a small kind of calabash or gourd, apparently resembling those used for the same purpose, at the distance of 5,000 miles, in the South of Africa ; excepting, that in some instances, the gourds of Nepal and of Scinde, are ornamented with mountings of gold or silver, a luxury in which the African dobs not indulge! In the same part of Africa, among the Zoolu -Kaffirs, other kinds of snuff-boxes, of smaller size are m common use. _ These are made of the seeds oi a species of Zamia, ornamented with strings of small beads, and are worn suspended as earrings, from the. ears of the natives.
In China, flasks are used, the form and size of a smelling bottle; these are of different kinds of aterial, some being cut out of rock crystal, and ners made of porcelain and similar plastic sub- ances. bnuff-takers are less numerous in China _ an smokers of tobacco; in powder, or as the
evineftSaI’ “smoke for the no< is little used, ept by the Mantchoo Tartars and Mongols, and
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THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
among the Mandarins and lettered classes. The Tartars are real amateurs, and snuff is with them an object of the most important consideration. For the Chinese aristocracy, on the contrary, _ it is a mere luxury — a habit that they try to aequo e a whim. The custom of taking snuff was intro- duced into China by the old missionaries who resided at the Court. They used to get the snuff from Europe for themselves, and some ot the Mandarins tried it, and found it good. . l>y degrees the custom spread; people who wished to appear fashionable, liked to be taking tins “smoke for the nose;’1 and Pekm is stdlpur excellence, the locality of snuff-takers. The hist dealers in it made immense fortunes. The French tobacco was the most esteemed ; and as it hap- pened at this time, that it had for a stamp the ancient emblem of the three fieur de hs, the mark has never been forgotten, and the three jiewr de Its are stiff in Pekin, the only sign of a dealer m tobacco. The Chinese have now, for a long time manufactured their own snuff, but _ they r do not subject it to any fermentation, and it is not . worth much. They merely pulverize the leaves, sift the powder tiff it is as fine as flour, and afterward^ perfume it with flowers and. essences A curious method of snuffing, requiring neither box no flask is noticed in the “Voyages and Researches of the Adventure and Beagle ” At Otaheite, a su - stance not unlike powdered rhubarb m apix.n -nice but of a very pleasant fragrance, is rubbed on a' niece of shark's skin stretched on wood , and ■m old man who had one of these snuff sticks in r^on, valued it. so highly, that he could
not be induced to part with it.
Boxes of very rude construct 101 J mai-e jn France and Germany from birch barl^ and ^ in the streets of Paris and other continental cities,
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
87
for about one halfpenny each. These have lately been seen in the shops of London tobacconists, under the name of “ German boxes,” at about three times the above price. They are used abroad either for tobacco or snuff. Boxes are also made of horn, either black buffalo or transparent pressed horn — the latter at a much cheaper rate than the former. St. Helena contributed to the Great Exhibition snuff-boxes made from the willow under which the remains of Napoleon reposed, until their removal to France, and also from a willow planted by him at Longwood. Van .Die- man’s Land contributed a box made from the tooth of the Sperm whale, as well as boxes from several native woods.
The Scotch snuff-boxes are justly celebrated for the perfection of their hinge, and close fitting cover. They were originally made at Lawrence- kirk, but the manufacture has now spread to various parts of Scotland. The wood employed principally in the manufacture of these boxes is the sycamore (or plane of the Scotch). Mr. W. Chambers states, “ that from a rough block of this wood, worth twenty-five shillings, snuff-boxes may be made to the value of three thousand pounds.”
The modus operandi in making these boxes is described as follows : — The box is made from a solid block of wood ; the first operation consists in making a number of circular excavations in close contiguity to each other, by means of a centre-bit, or a clrill running in a lathe ; the interior is then’ squared out by means of gouges and chisels, and is afteT wards smoothed with files and glass-paper, -the celebrated hinge is formed partly out of the substance of the box, and partly out of that of the tu, the greatest attention being paid in its con- struction to the accurate fitting of the various parts
88
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
one into the other. The box is lined in the inside with stout tin-foil, and is painted on the outside with several coats of colour, each of which is rubbed down smooth with glass-paper before the succeed- ing coat is applied. It is then ready to receive the various styles of ornament, which, in some cases, are produced by the hand of the artist, and in others by mechanical means. The most usual decoration consists of the tartan patterns, the com- ponent lines of which are drawn separately, by pens fixed in a ruling machine, on to the box itself, if bounded by planes or slightly curved surfaces ; although such lines were also formerly drawn by means of a rose engine on circular boxes, it is now found a more convenient practice to rule the lines on paper, and then to attach the paper to the boxes. Another style of ornamentation, known as the Scoto-Russian, is of more recent introduction, and imitates, in a remote degree, the beautiful enamelled silver snuff-boxes for which Russia has long been famous. In these, the outside of the box is first covered with stout tin-foil, then com- pletely painted all over the surface, and afterwards placed in the ruling machine, which traces upon it an intricate pattern of curved and straight lines, by means of a sharp flat tool. This instrument penetrates completely through the paint, hut only scrapes the tin-foil, which is left very bright, and resembles inlaid silver. Several coats of copal varnish, each of which is successively polished down, are then applied to complete the snuff- box.
Box-wood, box-root, king-wood, ebony, and all kinds of hard wood ; tin, brass, pewter, lead, silver, and all sorts of metals, are used for snuff-boxes, some of these cheap and rudely fashioned, others elaborate and expensive ; some lined with tortoise- shell or horn, others with tin or lead-foil ; and
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
89
invention has been taxed to produce all kinds of ornamentation.
The practice of using snuff is said to have come into England after the Eestoration, and to have been brought from France ; but it is well known that the habit of mere snuff-taking did not ori- ginate with the introduction of tobacco, since there are recipes for making snuff from herbs in the oldest medicinal works extant. The use of tobacco snuff has been referred to the age of Catherine de Medicis, and it was recommended to her son, Charles IX., for his chronic headaches. Snuff- taking was formerly characteristic of the medical piofession ; and the gold-headed cane and gold snuff-box came to be the peculiar emblems of those who were learned in the healing art.
There are almost an endless variety of snuffs as of noses, the. purest kind being the cc Scotch ” made either entirely from the stalks removed from the leaf in the course of its preparation for the cigar f C? stalks with a small quantity of leaf. The
Welsh and “ Lundyfoot” are affirmed to owe their qualities chiefly, if not altogether, to the circum- stance of then’ being dried almost to scorching * hence they have received the appellation of “ high- dried snuffs. The “ Kappees” and other dark snuffs are manufactured from the darker and ranker leaves, ocenting, which the dark snuffs undergo, also fur- nish names and procure customers for numerous varieties There is a story current, that the cele- biated Lundyfoot” had its origin in an accident one version affirming that the man who was attend- ing to the batches got drunk, neglected his dutv and made his master’s fortune; another, that an accidental fire did that for the firm which in the o her case it is affirmed that an extra glass of grog Accomplished. There is nothing surprising in this and either narrative may be true ; mosSS
90
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
of this kind, like the claying of sugar, had their origin in accidents. A certain quantity of snuff, in the preparation, gets overdone in some of the steps of the process, at some time or other, and the firm resolves, perhaps, as it is not altogether useless, to try and realize something for it. The peculiarity just tickles certain noses, and for the future they wish for none but spoilt snuff ; that which was at first spoilt accidentally, is now spoilt for the purpose, to supply the demands of the market at even a higher rate than ordinary, and the name of Lundyfoot becomes immortalized amongst old ladies through all succeeding genera- tions. What other experiments and other acci- dents of over-salting or over-liming may have done, has not transpired; and who may be the next so to turn circumstances to account, that what would ordinarily be considered a misfortune, shall be turned to good fortune, time alone will
1 John Hardham was Garrick’s under-treasurer, and kept a snuff-shop in Fleet Street, at the sign of the Red Lion, where he contrived to get into hio'h vo<me, a particular poudre de tcibac, still known as°Hardham?s 37. Stevens, while daily visiting Johnson in Bolt Court, on the subject of their joint editorship of Shakespeare, never failed to replenish his box at the shop of a man who was for years the butt of his witticisms. Hardham died a bachelor, September 20, 1772 and bequeathed £(5000 — the savings of a busy life — for the benefit of the poor ot his native city, Chestei .
As a pinch of snuff ends in a sneeze, so sniffing ends in sneezing, and with a hearty sneeze we brinn' our pinch ot snuff to a sudden ending. What comfort and consolation there is sometimes in a hearty sneeze, no one knows better than him who has ‘just made two or three attempts, and
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
91
ingloriously failed. With half closed eyes, and open mouth, and bated breath — once — twice — thrice — • no ! it will not he beguiled — psh-h-h-h-haw ! “ God bless you ! ”
“ The year 750,” says a writer in the Gentlemans Magazine , “is commonly reckoned the era of the custom of saying God bless you to one who hap- pens to sneeze.” It is said that, in the time of the pontificate of St. Gregory the Great, the air was filled with such a deleterious influence, that they who sneezed immediately expired. On this the devout pontiff appointed a form of prayer, and a wish to be said to persons sneezing for averting them from the fatal effects of this malignancy. A fable contrived against all the rules of proba- bility, it being certain that this custom has from time immemorial, subsisted in all parts of the known world. According to mythology, the first sign of life Prometheus’s artificial man gave, was by sternutation. This supposed creator is said to have stolen a portion of the solar rays, and filling a phial with them, sealed it up hermetically. He instantly flew back to his favourite automaton, and opening ■ the phial, held it close to the statue, the rays still retaining all their activity, insinuated themselves through the pores, and set the facti- tious man a sneezing. Prometheus transported with success, offered up a prayer with wishes for the preservation of so singular a being. The auto- maton observed him, remembering his ejaculations, was careful, on like occasions to offer these wishes in behalf of his descendants, who perpetuated it from . father to son in all their colonies. The Pabbis, also, fix a very ancient date to the custom. Pliny says, that to sneeze to the right was deemed fortunate ; to the left, and near a place of burial, the reverse. Tiberius, otherwise a sour man, would perform this right of blessing most punctually to
92
THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
others, and expect the same from others to himself. Aristotle has a problem, “ Why sneezing from noon to midnight was good, but from night to noon unlucky.” St. Austin tells us that the ancients were accustomed to go to bed again, if they sneezed while they put on their shoe.
When Themistocles sacrificed in his galley be- fore the battle of Xeres, one of the assistants upon the right hand sneezed, Euphrantides the sooth- sayer, presaged the victory of the Greeks, and the overthrow of the Persians.
When the Greeks were consulting concerning their retreat in the time of Cyrus the Younger, it chanced that one of them sneezed, at the noise whereof, the rest of the soldiers called upon Jupiter Soter.
Brand tells us, that when the king of Mesopo- tamia sneezes, acclamations are made in all parts of his dominions. The Siamese wish long life to persons sneezing. And the Persians look upon sneezing as a happy omen, especially when re- peated often.
A writer lately gives us the following “ Philo- sophy of a sneeze” for which he alone is responsible. “ The nose receives three sets of nerves — the nerves of smell, those of feeling , and those of motion. The former communicate to the brain, the odorous pro- perties of substances with which they may come in contact, in a diffused or concentrated state ; the second, communicate the impressions of touch ; the third, move the muscles of the nose ; but the power of these muscles is very limited. When a sneeze occurs, all these faculties are excited to a high degree. A grain of snuff excites the olfactory nerves, which despatch to the brain the intelligence that : snuff has attacked the nostril.’ The brain instantly sends a mandate through the motor nerves to the muscles, saying ‘ cast it out 1 ’ and
SNIFFING AND SNEESHIN.
93
the result is unmistakable. So offensive is ■ the enemy besieging the nostril held to be, that the nose is not left to its own defence. It were too feeble to accomplish this. An allied army of mus- cles join in the rescue — nearly one-half the body arouses against the intruder — from the muscles of the lips to those of the abdomen, all unite in the effort for the expulsion of the grain of snuff.”
CHAPTER VII.
QUID PEO QUO.
“A third party sprang up, headed hy the descendants of Eobert Chetvit, the companion of the great Hudson. These discarded pipes altogether, and took to chewing tobacco; hence, they were called • Quids." — Knickerbocker's New York.
'r'i H
Any one who will take the trouble to read through the “Curiosities of Food,” will soon become con- vinced, from the examples which Mr. P. L. Sim- monds has collected so assiduously from all parts of the world, that there is no accounting for tastes. What extraordinary tilings men will admit between their teeth to gratify their appetites, is almost enough to set one’s own teeth on edge. Tobacco is certainly not more nauseous or revolting, than to us would be many of the delicacies dished up tor dinner by some of the bipedal race. “ Some Euro- peans,” observes the author, “chew tobacco, the Hindoo takes to betel nut and lime, while the Patagonian finds contentment in a bit of guano, and "the Styrians grow fat and ruddy on arsenic. English children delight in sweetmeats and sugar- candy, while those of Africa prefer rock salt. A Frenchman likes frogs and snails, and we eat cels, oysters, and whelks. To the Esquimaux, train oil is your only delicacy. The Russian luxuriates upon his hide and tallow; the Chinese upon iats, puppy dogs, and shark’s fins;, the Kaffir upon elephant’s foot and trunk or lion steaks , wni e
QUID PRO QUO.
95
the Pacific islander places cold missionary above every other edible. Why then should we be sur- prised at mens feeding upon rattle snakes and monkeys, and pronouncing them capital eating ?”* Nothing is more extraordinary than the habit of dirt-eating and chewing of lime, either by them- selves or in combination with other substances. But more of this anon. Tobacco, as a masticatory, might equally cause surprise did it not daily occur at our doors. The quantity used in this form will not bear comparison with that consumed in smoke, but even this is considerable. In America, the custom is carried to a very unpleasant extent, and were it the only form in which the plant could be indulged, there is good ground for presuming that it would fall very far short of the popularity which it has attained.
Somebody, with a strong antipathy to pig-tail and fine cut, has entered into certain investigations and calculations in the Philadelphia Journal , which has resulted in this wise. It a tobacco chewer chews for fifty years, and uses each day of that peiiod two inches of solid jilug, he will consume nearly one mile and a quarter in length of solid tobacco, half an inch thick and two inches broad costing 2,094 dollars, or about £500. Plug ugly’ sure enough ! By the same process of reasoning’ s statist calculates, tliat if a man ejects one pint ot saliva per day for fifty years (a feat, one would presume, it would require a Yankee to accomplish) the total would swell into nearly 2,300 gallons’ quite a respectable lake, and almost enough to float the “ Great Eastern” in! Truly, Brother Jonathan, there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy Another calculation shows, that if ah the tobacco
Curiosities of Food, by P. L. Sirumonds. Bentley, 1859.
96 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEF.
which the British people have consumed during the last three years were worked up into pig-tail half an inch thick, it would form a line 99,470 miles long; or enough to go nearly four times round the world ;* or if the tobacco consumed by the same people in the same period were to he placed in one scale, and St. Paul’s Cathedral and Westminster Abbey in the other, the ecclesiastical buildings would kick the beam.
“ Oh, the nasty creatures 1” some lady exclaims. “Who could suppose that they would do such a thing, and to such an extent too, as to burn and chew and smoke in three years enough tobacco to reach round the world four times !” It is astonish- ing, my dear Mrs. Partington, we must confess ; but let us compare therewith the tea consumption! for the same period, and we shall find that during the past three years, we have consumed about 205,500,000 of pounds of tea, which, if done up in packages containing one quarter of a pound each — such packages being 4\ inches in length and 2^ inches in diameter — these placed end to end, would reach 59,428 miles ; or, upon the same principles as those adopted for the pig-tail, would girdle the earth twice with a belt of tea 21 inches in diameter, or twenty-five times that of the aforesaid pig-tail. Enough to make rivers ot tea strong enough for any old lady in the kingdom to enjoy, and deep enough for all the old ladies in the king- dom to bathe in.
* Tobacco entered for Lome consumption-
1856 1857 1858
32,579,166 lbs. 32,851,365 lbs. 34,110,850 lbs.
Total 99,541,381 lbs.— or 44,43S tons.
t Tea entered for home consumption in-
1856 1857 1858
63,295,643 lbs. 69,159,640 lbs. 73,217,483 lbs.
QUID PKO QUO.
97
All this, we are free to confess, does not make the habit of quidding either more justifiable or re- spectable, although indulged in by some of the mem- bers of the gentler sex. In Paraguay, for instance, an American traveller informs us that everybody smokes, and nearly every woman and girl more than thirteen years old chews tobacco. A magnificent Hebe, arrayed in satin and flashing in diamonds, puts you back with one delicate hand, while with the fair taper fingers of the other she takes the tobacco out of her mouth previous to your saluting her. An over delicate foreigner turns away with a shudder of loathing under such circumstances, and gets the epithet of “the savage” applied to him by the offended beauty for his sensitive squeamishness. However, one soon gets used to these things in Paraguay, where one is, per force of custom, obliged to kiss every lady one is introduced to, and one half of those you meet are really tempting enough to render you reckless of consequences.
Suppose not that Paraguay is a solitary instance in which ladies have a predilection for this mas- ticatory. In Siberia, which is far enough geogra- phically to prevent any collusion, or the influence of example to exert its power, Captain Cochrane says that the Tchuktchi eat, chew, smoke, and snuff at the same time. He saw amongst them, boys and girls of nine or ten years of age who put a large leaf of tobacco into their mouths without permitting any saliva to escape, nor would they put aside the tobacco should meat be offered to them, but continued consuming both of them together.
The Mintira women and other races of the great Indian Archipelago are addicted to chewing tobacco. Amongst the Nubians, the custom is more common than smoking. Of the South American tribes, the Sercucumas of the Erevato, and the Caura neigh- bours of the whitish Taparitos, swallow tobacco
n
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THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
chopped small, and impregnated with some other stimulant juices.
In Africa, the habit is not at all an uncommon one. The Turks and Arabs of Egypt, are great smokers, but not so with the other tribes. The Mongrabins, scarcely know the use of a pipe, or the method of manufacturing a cigar, yet tobacco is well known, and chewing is the order of the day. With them each piece of tobacco is mixed with a portion of natron. Master and servant, rich and poor, all carry about them a pouch of tobacco, with pieces of natron in it. These people do not carry the quid in their cheek, as do the Europeans who indulge in the habit, but in front, between the teeth and the upper lip. I
The blacks of Gesira have another method of enjoying this luxury. They make a cold infusion of tobacco, and dissolve the natron in it. This mixture is called “ bucca.” The natives take a mouthful of it from the bucca cup, which they keep rinsing and working about in their mouths for a quarter of an hour before they eject it. So much do they delight in it, that it is considered the highest treat a man can offer to his dearest friends, to invite them to sip the bucca with him. Bucca parties are given, as in some localities tea parties are honoured. All sit in solemn silence as the cup goes round, each taking a mouthful, and nothing is heard save the gurgling and working inside the closed mouths. On such occasions the most impor- • tant questions receive no reply, for to open the i mouth and answer would be to lose the cherished “ bucca.”
In Iceland, tobacco is chewed and snuffed as assiduously as it is smoked in other countries ; and I in the northern states of Europe, or some of them, the powdered leaf, which, with most people is- deemed a preparation for the nose, is placed, a
QUID PRO QUO.
99
pinch at a time, upon the tongue. Of Joubert’s statement we scarce know what opinion to hold. He says, “ When a stranger arrives in Greenland, he is immediately surrounded by a crowd of the natives, who ask the favour of sucking the empyreumatic oil in the reservoir of his pipe. And it is .stated that the Greenlanders smoke only for the pleasure of drinking that detestable juice which is so disgusting to European smokers.” The Fin- lander delights in chewing. He will remove his quid from time to time, and stick it behind his ear, and then chew it again. This reminds us of a circumstance narrated by a friend, which occurred when he was a boy. His master was a chewer. After a “quid” had been masticated for some time, it was removed from his mouth, and thrown against the wall, where it remained sticking ; the apprentice was then called to write beside it the date at which it was flung there, so that it might be taken down in its proper turn, after being thoroughly dried, to be chewed over again.
“ And then he tried to sing All’s well,
But could not though he tried ;
His head was turned, and so he chewed His pig-tail till he died.”
Of all tobacco chewers, none can compete with the Yankee — not even our own Jack Tars. They are the very perfection of masticators, and of spitters, also, if the narratives of travellers in general, and of Dickens in particular, are to be relied on. “As Washington may be called the head-quarters of tobacco-tinctured saliva, the time is come when I must confess, without any disguise, that the prevalence of these two odious practices of chewing and expectorating began, about this time, to be anything but agreeable, and soon became most offensive and sickening. In all the
h 2
100 THE SEVEN SISTERS OF SLEEP.
public places of America, this filthy custom is recognized. In the courts of law, the judge has his spittoon, the crier his, the witness his, and the prisoner his, while the jurymen and spectators are provided for, as so many men who, in the course of nature, must desire to spit incessantly. In the hospitals, the students of medicine are requested by notices upon the wall, to eject their tobacco ' juice into the boxes provided for that purpose, and not to discolour the stairs. In public buildings * visitors are implored, through the same agency, to squirt the essence of their ‘quids’ or ‘plugs,’ as I have heard them called by gentlemen learned in this kind of sweetmeat, into the national spittoons, and not about the bases of the marble columns. But in some parts this custom is inseparably mixed up with every meal and morning call, and with all the transactions of social life! The stranger who follows in the track I took myself, will find it in its full bloom and glory at Washington; and let him not persuade himself (as I once did to my shame) that previous tourists have exaggerated its extent. The thing itself is an exaggeration of nastiness which cannot be outdone.
“ On board the steamboat there were two young gentlemen, with shirt collars reversed, as usual, and armed with very big walking sticks, who planted two seats in the middle of the deck, at a distance of some four paces apart, took out their tobacco boxes, and sat down opposite each other to chew. In less than a quarter of an hour’s time, these hopeful youths had shed about them on the i clean boards, a copious shower of yellow rain, . clearing by that means a kind of magic circle, within "whose limits no intruders dared to come, and which they never failed to refresh and! refresh before a spot was dry. This being before breakfast, rather disposed me, I