Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce Part 8

"Then n.o.blemen's chimneys used to smoke, and not their noses; Englishmen without were not Blackamoores within, for then Tobacco was an Indian, unpickt and unpiped,--now made the common ivy-bush of luxury, the curtaine of dishonesty, the proclaimer of vanity, the drunken colourer of Drabby solacy."

In the "Soule's Solace, or Thirty-and-One Spiritual Emblems," by Thomas Jenner, occurs the following verses:

"The Indian weed, withered quite, Greene at noone, cut down at night, Shows thy decay; all flesh is hay; Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco.

The Pipe that is so lily-white, Show thee to be a mortal wight, And even such, gone with a touch, Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco.

And when the smoake ascends on high, Thinke thou beholdst the vanity Of worldly stuffe, gone with a puffe, Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco.

And when the Pipe grows foul within, Thinke on thy soul defiled with sin, And then the fire it doth require; Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco.

The ashes that are left behind, May serve to put thee still in mind, That unto dust return thou must; Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco."

b.u.t.tes, in a little volume ent.i.tled "Dyets Dry Dinner," (1599) says that "Tobacco was translated out of India in the seede or roote; native or sative in our own fruitfullest soils. It cureth any griefe, dolour, imposture, or obstruction proceeding of colde or winde, especially in the head or breast. The fume taken in a pipe is good against Rumes, ache in the head, stomacke, lungs, breast; also in want of meate, drinke, sleepe, or rest."

The introduction of tobacco from the colony of Virginia was followed soon after by a reduction of price that led to more frequent use among the poorer cla.s.ses, such as grooms and hangers on at taverns and ale-houses, who are alluded to in Rich's "Honestie of this Age":

"There is not so base a groome that comes into an ale-house to call for his pott, but he must have his pipe of tobacco; for it is a commodity that is nowe as vendible in every tavern, wine and ale-house, as eyther wine, ale or beare; and for apothecaerie's shops, grocer's shops, chandler's shops, they are never without company, that from morning till night, are still taking of tobacco. What a number are there besides, that doe keepe houses, set open shoppes, that have no other trade to live by, but by selling of tobacco. I have heard it told, that now very lately there hath been a catalogue of all those new erected houses that have sett up that trade of selling tobacco in London, and neare about London; and if a man may believe what is confidently reported, there are found to be upwards of seven thousand of houses that doth live by that trade.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Old London Ale-house.]

"If it be true that there be seven thousand shops in and about London, that doth vend tobacco, as it is credibly reported that there be over and above that number, it may well be supposed to be but an ill customed shop, that taketh not five s.h.i.+llings a day, one day with another throughout the whole year; or, if one doth take lesse, two other may take more; but let us make our account, but after two s.h.i.+llings sixpence a day, for he that taketh lesse than that would be ill able to pay his rent, or to keepe open his shop windows; neither would tobacco houses make such a muster as they do, and that almost in every lane, and in every by-corner round about London."

"A Tobacco seller is described after this manner by Blount in a volume "Micro-Cosmographie; Or A Piece of the World discovered; in Essays and Characters" (1628).

"A tobacco seller is the only man that finds good in it which others brag of, but doe not, for it is meate, drinke, and clothes to him. No man opens his ware with greater seriousness, or challenges your judgment more in the operation. His Shop is the Randenvous of spitting, where men dialogue with their noses, and their conversation is smoke.

It is the place only where Spain is commended, and preferred before England itself.

"He should be well experienced in the World; for he has daily tryall as men's nostrils, and none is better acquainted with humour. His is the piecing commonly of some other trade, which is bawd to his Tobacco, and that to his wife, which is the flame that follows the smoke."

Early in the Seventeenth Century began the persecution by royal haters of the plant, others, however, had denounced the weed and its use and users, but venting nothing more than a tirade of words against it, had but little effect in breaking up the trade or the custom.[44] James I.

sent forth his famous "Counterblast" and in the strongest manner condemned its use. A portion of it reads thus:

[Footnote 44: Elizabeth during her reign, published an edict against its use, a.s.signing as a reason, that her subjects, by employing the same luxuries as barbarians, were likely to degenerate into barbarism.

"From the first introduction of the weed, the votaries of the pipe have enjoyed all the blessings of persecution. Kings have punished, priests have anathematized, satirists satirized and women scolded; but still the weed, with its divers shapes and different names, reigns supreme among narcotics in every region of the globe."--_Emerson's Magazine._]

"Surely smoke becomes a kitchen fane better than a dining chamber: and yet it makes a kitchen oftentimes in the inward parts of men, soyling and injecting with an unctuous oyly kind of roote as hath been found in some great tobacco takers, that after death were opened. A custom loathsome to the eye, harmful to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and the black stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless."[45]

[Footnote 45: Another writer in the same censorious manner says of the use of tobacco, "Smoking is the jovial repast of Cannibals or Man-eaters, and the grand entertainment of idolatrous Pagan Festivals. Masters will not permit the use of it to their servants or slaves and such as use it can hardly find masters or buyers."]

Quaint old Burton in his "Anatomy of Melancholy," recognizes the virtues of the plant while he anathematizes its abuse. He says:--

"Tobacco, divine, rare, superexcellent tobacco, which goes far beyond all their panacetas, potable gold, and philosophers' stones, a soveraign remedy to all diseases. A good vomit, I confesse, a vertuous herb, if it be well qualified, opportunely taken, and medicinally used; but, as it is commonly abused by most men, which take it as tinkers do ale, 'tis a plague, a mischief, a violent purger of goods, lands, health, h.e.l.lish, divelish and d.a.m.ned tobacco, the ruine and overthrow of body and soul."

The duty on importation had been only twopence per pound, a moderate sum in view of the prices realized by the sale of it.

The King now increased it to the enormous sum of two s.h.i.+lling and ten pence. James termed the custom of using tobacco an "evil vanitie"

impairing "the health of a great number of people their bodies weakened and made unfit for labor, and the estates of many mean persons so decayed and consumed, as they are thereby driven to unthriftie s.h.i.+fts only to maintain their gluttonous exercise thereof."[46] Brodigan says of the "Counterblast:"

[Footnote 46: "King James' violent prejudices against all use of tobacco arose from his aversion to Sir Walter Raleigh, its first importer into England whom he intended a sacrifice to the gratification of the King of Spain."]

"However absurd his reasoning may appear, it unfortunately happened that he possessed the power to reduce his aversion to practice, and he may be considered as the author of that unwarrantable persecution of the tobacco plant, which under varying circ.u.mstances, has been injudiciously continued to the present time."

Other royal haters of the plant issued the most strenous laws[47] and affixed penalties of the severest kind, of these may be mentioned the King of Persia, Amuroth IV. of Turkey, the Emperor Jehan-Gee and Popes Urban VIII. and Innocent XII., the last of whom showed his dislike to many other customs beside that of tobacco taking.

[Footnote 47: The Empress Elizabeth was less severe. She decreed that the snuff-boxes of those who made use of them in church should be confiscated to the use of the beadle.]

One of the edicts which he issued was against the taking of snuff in St. Peters, at Rome; this was in 1690; it was, however, revoked by Pope Benedict XIV., who himself had acquired the indulgence.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Punishment for snuff-taking.]

Early in the Seventeenth Century tobacco found its way to Constantinople. To punish the habit, a Turk was seized and a pipe transfixed through his nose.

The death of King James, followed by its occupancy of the throne by his son Charles I., did not lessen the persecution against tobacco.[48] In 1625, the year of his accession, he issued a proclamation against all tobaccos excepting only the growth of Virginia and Somerites. Charles II. also prohibited the cultivation of tobacco in England and Ireland, attaching a penalty of 10 per rood.

Fairholt, in alluding to the Stuarts and Cromwell as persecutors of tobacco, says:

[Footnote 48: Tobacco has been able to survive such attacks as these--nay, has raised up a host of defenders as well as opponents. The Polish Jesuits published a work ent.i.tled "Anti-Misocapnus," in answer to King James. In 1628, Raphael Thorius wrote a poem "Hymnus Tobaci." A host of names appear in the field: Lesus, Braum and Simon Pauli, Portal, Pia, Vauquelin, Gardanne, Posselt, Reimann, and De Morveau.]

"Cromwell disliked the plant, and ordered his troops to trample down the crop wherever found."

It is an historical fact that both James I. and the two Charleses as well as Cromwell had the strongest dislike against the Indian weed.

With such powerful foes it seems hardly possible that the custom should have increased to such an extent that when William ascended the throne the custom was said to be almost universal.[49] "Pipes grew larger and ruled by a Dutchman, all England smoked in peace." From this time forward the varieties used served only to increase the demand for the tobacco of the colonies, and as its culture became better understood the leaf grew in favor, until the demand for it was greater than the production.

[Footnote 49: Says an enthusiastic writer on tobacco, "If judged by the vicissitudes through which it has traveled, it must indeed be acknowledged a hero among plants; and if human pity, respect, or love should be given it for 'the dangers it has pa.s.sed,' the inspiration of Desdemonia's love for Oth.e.l.lo, then might its most eloquent opponent be dumb, or yield it no inconsiderable need of homage."]

During the reign of Anne, the custom of smoking appears to have attained its greatest height in England; the consumption of tobacco was then proportionally greater, considering the population, than it is at the present time. Spooner, in his "Looking-Gla.s.s for Smokers,"

1703, says of the custom:

"The sin of the kingdom in the intemperate use of tobacco, swelleth and increaseth so daily, that I can compare it to nothing but the waters of Noah, that swell'd fifteen cubits above the highest mountains. So that if this practice shall continue to increase as it doth, in an age or two it will be as hard to find a family free, as it was so long time since one that commonly took it."

When tobacco was first introduced into England its sale was confined to apothecaries, but afterwards it was dealt in by tobacconists, who sold other goods besides tobacco.

About the middle of the Seventeenth Century the culture of tobacco commenced in England; it continued, however, only for a short time, for the rump parliament in 1652 prohibited the planting of it, and two years later Cromwell and his council appointed commissioners for strictly putting this act in execution: and in 1660 it was legally enacted, that from the first of January, 1660-1, no person whatever should sow or plant any tobacco in England, under certain penalties.

In England drinking or smoking tobacco seems to have met with more success (as a mode of use) rather than chewing (now so popular). It was princ.i.p.ally confined to the lower cla.s.ses, and was common among soldiers and sailors. When used by gentlemen it was common to carry a silver basin to spit in.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Silver spittoons.]

The habit of smoking or using tobacco in any form was then more constant than now, and its use was common in almost all places of public gathering. It was the custom to smoke in theatres; stools being provided for those who paid for their use and the privilege of smoking on the stage. Tobacco was also sold at some of the play-houses, and proved a source of profit, doubtless, beyond even the representation of the plays. We should infer also from some of the early stage plays, that the "players" used the weed even when acting their parts.

Rowlands gives the following poem on tobacco in his "Knave of Clubs,"

1611:--

"Who durst dispraise tobacco whilst the smoke is in my nose, Or say, but fah! my pipe doth smell, I would I knew but those Durst offer such indignity to that which I prefer.

For all the brood of blackamoors will swear I do not err, In taking this same worthy whif with valiant cavalier, But that will make his nostrils smoke, at cupps of wine or beer.

When as my purse can not afford my stomach flesh or fish, I sop with smoke, and feed as well and fat as one can wish.

Come into any company, though not a cross you have, Yet offer them tobacco, and their liquor you shall have.

They say old hospitalitie kept chimnies smoking still; Now what your chimnies want of that, our smoking noses will.