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It is this high and noble sentiment, which I am happy in believing pervades the morale' of the Service, that stamps a character of worth upon our navy.-Esto perpetua. STORMY JACK,

MORE ABOUT TOBACCO.

[In our volume for 1842, will be found some interesting particulars about the "weed." Another recognition of it from its native land may not be out of place here, though it is transplanted from a Canadian Journal.-ED.] MR. EDITOR.-It has often occurred to me during the last few weeks, that some account of the history of the Tobacco plant, now in such general and extensive use on this continent, might not prove uninteresting to many of your readers; few of whom, while on some cold winter evening cosily enjoying at their own fireside, the comfortable and luxurious languor, which the fumigation of the weed so gently diffuses, are aware of how strange and eventful a history, and through how many vicissitudes, exultations, proscriptions, extravagant eulogies, and unqualified condemnations, that wonderful plant the Nicotiana Tabacum, a nauseous, poisonous weed, of acrid taste and disagreeable odour, has during the lape of a few centuries forced itself into every corner of the inhabited globe; and instead of being the insignificant production of some uninhabited forest or obscure district, has succeeded in diffusing itself throughout every climate, and in subjecting the inhabitants of every country to its dominion.

Aye! Far amid the icy deserts of the frigid zone, as our adventurous navigators have found upon the snow the footsteps of the Greenlander, the Laplander, and Esquimaux; there also have they found the name of this astonishing plant known and valued by these hardy wanderers of the north, far beyond the hard-earned trophies of the chase or the spoils of the sea.

But it is not in the frozen regions alone that we find it thus valued and sought for. The Arab tills the burning sands of the desert, that it may yield him tobacco; and the sable monarch of an hundred wives on Afric's burning shore, freely consigns annually thousands of his subjects to slavery that he may obtain tobacco; and where amongst the various tribes of swarthy warriors, who roam by mountain, forest, river and prairie, over this vast continent, from the golden sands of California to the lonely waters of the far Slave Lake, from the miserable root-digger who gains a scanty and precarious living upon the rugged and barren steeps of the Rocky Mountains, to his more manly and warlike brother who sweeps like the desert storm, and not less wildly, o'er the far rolling waves of the boundless prairie;-where, I ask, amidst them all, will you find one, whom this mighty magician does not count his slave, and who does not own himself obedient to his sway?

Nor is it alone over the minds of savages that tobacco thus reigns triumphant. The civilized world is no less its slave. The tired soldier

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on the long march, or worse, on the weary and harrassed retreatwhen every article that might lighten his road or add to his fatigue, food, raiment―aye! even his arms, in an enemy's country, are cast away, still in some snug corner of his bosom will be found the bosom friend with whom he hopes to lighten the dreary watch, or mend the scanty repast-tobacco. The sailor, give him but this and he will cheerfully bear all other privations; he will brave the fury of the raging elements, dare all hardships, dangers and misfortunes, or rush cutlass in hand, upon the point of a pike, or into the cannon's mouth! and in the higher walks of civilized society, at the shrine of fashion, in the palace and in the cottage, the fascinating influence of this singular plant commands an equal tribute of devotion and attachment.

"A pipe," says Bulwer, "is a great soother! a pleasant comforter! Blue devils fly before its honest breath! it ripens the brain; it opens the house! and the man who smokes, thinks like a sage, and acts like a Samaritan."

With regard to the origin of this plant. Humboldt states in his personal narrative, that it had been cultivated from time immemorial by the inhabitants of Oronoco. And from various accounts of the discovery of America, we learn that it was in general use among the aboriginal inhabitants of this continent, and that the practice of smoking was common to all the tribes, who professed to cure many formidable diseases by it. Many authors have considered it probable, that it was known and used by the inhabitants of some parts of the continent of Asia, long before that period: however this may be, it is certain that from the western hemisphere it was first introduced into Europe, and thence at a later day into many parts of Asia. Columbus and his brave and adventurous followers, were the first Europeans who, after stemming for months with their frail barks the stormy billows of the broad Atlantic, at length on arriving at the island of Cuba in 1493, first beheld the practice of smoking. In 1559, the plant was first introduced into Spain and Portugal from this island, by a Spanish gentleman, Hernandez de Toledo; and Jean Nicot, from whom the plant obviously derives its generic name, being at that time ambassador at the court of Lisbon, from Francis II, either carried or transmitted the sced to Catherine de Medicis.

Monardes tells us, that the priests of the American Indians, whenever they were consulted by the chief persons, or Caciques, took certain leaves of the tobacco, and cast them into the fire, and received the smoke which they thus produced in their mouths; in consequence of which they fell down to the ground, and that, after remaining some time in a stupor, they recovered, and delivered the answers which they pretended to have received, during their supposed intercourse with the world of spirits.

Coming as it did from that vast and almost unknown continent, from whose distant and shadowy shores, mysterious tales had been wafted by the adventurous travellers who had reached them, of the wonders worked through its agency by the red savage of the western wilds; at that time, when the wildest and most incredible tales regarding them, were received with greedy and credulous avidity throughout Europe, we cannot be

surprised to learn, that tobacco, which in reality possessed powers of a very extraordinary nature, should have been regarded as one of the wonders of the new world, and valued accordingly. "In 1589," says Paris, "the Cardinal Santa Croce, returning from his nunciature in Spain and Portugal to Italy, carried thither with him tobacco; and we may form some notion of the enthusiasm, with which its production was hailed, from a perusal of the poetry which the subject inspired. The poets compare the exploits of the holy Cardinal, to that of his progenitor, who brought home the wood of the true cross.

"Herb of immortal fame,

Which hither first with Santa Croce came,
When he, his term of nunciature expired,
Back from the court of Portugal retired,
Even as his predecessor great and good,
Brought home the cross.'

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At this time its application on the continent of Europe, had been confined almost solely to the manufacture of snuff, and it was not till many years after its general use in this form, that the practice of smoking the leaf commenced in England. Accounts vary as to the exact period of its first introduction into England, some authors asserting that it was first used by Sir Walter Raleigh, others maintaining that we owe its introduction to Sir Francis Drake, when he returned with the colonists from Virginia, in 1586, and that being adopted by Sir Walter Raleigh, and other courtiers, it soon became common. About this time tobacco was sold in England for its weight in silver, and Aubrey says, "I have heard some of our old yeomen say, that when they went to Malmsbury or Chippenham Market, they called out the biggest shilling that lay in the scale, against the tobacco." Camden, in his "Elizabeth," also writes as follows, "From the time of the return of Sir Francis Drake and his companions, it (tobacco) began to grow into very general use, and to bear a high price; a great many persons, some from luxury, others for their health, being wont to draw in the strong smelling smoke with insatiable greediness, through an earthenware tube, and then to puff it forth again through their nostrils, so that tobacco taverns are now as generally kept in all our towns, as wine houses, or beer houses."

In the year 1600, the French ambassador in his despatches, represented the peers on the trial of the Earls of Essex and Southampton, as smoking tobacco copiously while they deliberated on their verdict, and Sir Walter Raleigh was accused of having sat with his pipe at the window of the armoury, while he looked on at the execution of Essex in the Tower. However untrue these stories may be, the fact of their being mentioned by the writers of the day, shews that they were not considered incredible, and proves how general the practice of smoking then was among the higher classes of society.

In 1603, James I. finding that the use of tobacco was proceeding to an extravagant and alarming extent amongst his subjects, many of whom he assures us expended as much as £500 annually on this article, (an enormous amount, when we consider the relative value of money at that period,) dipped his royal pen in ink, and came out with a philippic

entitled "A Counterblaste to Tobacco." In this celebrated paper he informs his loving subjects that, "smoking is a custom loathesome to the eye, and hatefull to the nose, harmeful to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black stinking fumes thereof, nearest resembling the horrible stygean smoake of the pit that is bottomlesse." Finding however in 1704, that his "Counterblaste" had not put out all the pipes of his subjects, this monarch endeavoured by the imposition of heavy duties, to abolish altogether its use in his dominions; and a few years afterwards he commanded that no planter in Virginia, should cultivate more than 100 lbs. In 1724, Pope Urban VIII, published a decree of excommunication, against all who took snuff in church. Ten years later, smoking was forbidden in Russia, under pain of having the nose cut off. In 1563, the council of the Canton of Appenzel cited smokers before them, whom they punished, and they ordered all inn-keepers to inform against such as were found smoking in their houses. The police regulations of Berne made in 1661, were divided according to the ten commandments, in which the prohibition of smoking stands immediately beneath the command against adultery. In 1690, Pope Innocent XII, excommunicated all those who were found taking snuff or tobacco in the church of St. Peter at Rome, and even so late as 1719, the senate of Strasburg prohibited its cultivation.

But notwithstanding the outcry raised against it by church and state tobacco grew and flourished; and the very prohibitions and admonitions which were intended to have banished it from the earth, fell around it only like showers upon the parched ground, rendering it more fertile and prolific, until now at the present time it holds undismayed sway, alike over the civilized and uncivilized world. Nor do I believe that another plant exists, unless it be the potato, the absence of which would now be more severely felt by the great bulk of mankind. It is true that many important articles of food are derived from the vegetable kingdom, while this is but a luxury; but this is only one of the few, if not the only luxury, which is permitted to be enjoyed alike by the rich and the poor-the man of refinement and the savage. It soothes the long, dreary, wintry solitude of the Laplander and the Esquimaux, no less than it cheers the fireside of the cottager, or lends serenity to the vacant hours of the voluptuary.

The enormous increase in the use of this drug, may be easily estimated from the fact, that for the year 1836 the duty alone on tobacco imported into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland for home consumption, amounted to £3,354,594 sterling!

Having said this upon the natural and political history of this plant, I shall proceed before I close to say a few words concerning its action upon the human frame, according to the manner in which it is taken, either snuffed, smoked or chewed. A very celebrated medical writer of the present day (Prout) thus alludes to it: "Although confessedly one of the most virulent poisons in nature, yet such is the fascinating influence of this noxious weed, that mankind resort to it in every mode they can devise to insure its stupifying and pernicious agency. Tobacco disorders the assimilating functions in general, but particularly, as I

believe, the assimilation of the saccharine principle. I have never been able, indeed, to trace the development of oxalic acid to the use of tobacco; but that some analogous and equally poisonous principle (probably of an acid nature) is generated in certain individuals by its abuse, is evident from their cachectic looks, and from the dark and often greenish yellow tint of their blood. The severe and peculiar dyspeptic symptoms sometimes produced by inveterate snuff taking are well known, and I have more than once seen such cases terminate fatally in malignant disease of the stomach or liver. Great smokers also, especially those who employ short pipes and cigars are said to be liable to cancerous affections of the lips. But it happens with tobacco, as with deleterious articles of diet, the strong and healthy suffer comparatively little, while the weak and predisposed to disease fall victims to its poisonous operation."

This latter remark is evidently one reason why the use of tobacco, in so few instances, appears to produce any very marked deleterious effect; but there is another reason, viz: that the use of tobacco to become a habit, must, like that of all other narcotics, be slowly acquired. No one can at once begin and continue the use of tobacco in any considerable quantity. Nature gives notice when she will be tampered with no longer, and the slightest excess in a young beginner is productive of such deadly nausea, sinking and general prostration, that it will be long 'ere he attempts the experiment again. But while its use to any extent must be slowly acquired, that the system may become gradually inured to it, so the poisonous and deleterious effects which proceed from it, are yet produced so slowly and insidiously, that the unhappy victim, who has for years been binding himself more firmly in chains of slavery to his pipe, his quid or his snuff box, can hardly believe, when his health, and the powers of his mind begin to decline, that these untoward effects are to be ascribed to the idol he has worshipped in confidence so long. The idea of the friend and social companion of his life being in reality his worst and deadliest enemy, never for a moment enters his head; he applies for aid to his physician, who too seldom makes the use of tobacco a point of enquiry.

The fact is, that the first symptoms arising from the abuse of this drug are such as might, and do arise, from other and different causes also. Thus dyspepsia, hystiria, and hypochondriasis, are found dependant on other causes besides the abuse of tobacco, while the symptoms are only the results of such effects having been produced, without pointing in any way to the cause which has given rise to them. Thus the unfortunate applicant for relief is dieted, i.e. half starved, and dosed with tonics of all descriptions, not only without advantage, but often with a marked aggravation of his symptoms. And why? because being debarred from using the articles of food for which he has the keenest relish, he retires like a suffering martyr to some corner to solace himself with his pipe:and thus while the doctor is racking his brains for some new and more effective remedy for his indigestion, the submissive patient swallows all his infernal combinations, and wanders like an uneasy spectre over the face of the earth, bearing about with him, as his only consolation, the pipe of his afflictions, or the snuff-box of his woe!

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