vilest Latin, of which the following is an attempt at a translation.

'A few years ago this plant was discovered by Portuguese, French, Dutch and English as a denizen of the West Indies

For you may see many sailors who have returned from that country who carry little funnels made of a coiled palm leaf or of reeds, into one end of which are placed curled, broken up and dried leaves of this [Nicotiana] plant. They set light to it and drawing it into their mouths as much as they can, they suck in the smoke by inhalation. They are thereby enabled to endure hunger and thirst, to maintain their strength and to exhilarate the spirits. They declare that it soothes the brain with a pleasant form of intoxication, and it certainly gives rise to an incredible quantity of spittle. It does not easily affect those who are accustomed to it, nor does it produce delirium with rigors (?) [dementat frigore] like Hyoscyamus, but it affects the cavities of the brain with its soothing aroma.

'The use of Hyoscyamus is attended with danger. Our drug, however, is rightly called the holy herb, because it satisfies hunger, it heals ulcers and wounds, and it is good for diseases of the chest and wasting of the lungs. In fact there is no new thing that our age has obtained from America that is more efficacious as a remedy.'

It is interesting to find Lobel and other early writers pointing out the pharmacological resemblance of the two genera Nicotiana and Hyoscyamus. Many of the Solanaceae besides Tobacco and Henbane are known to contain active pharmacological principles which produce narcotic effects. Lobel might have included among these the Mandragora (Mandragora officinalis),* probably the 'Dudaim' of the Bible, as well as the different genera described as 'nightshades' (Solanun, Atropa, etc.). Thus a new narcotic from the West had been added to poppy and mandragora and all the drowsy syrups from the East. In a later work Lobel refers to tobacco as 'Hyoscyamus Peruvianus,' giving its Belgian' name as tobacco.† It is clear from the attitude of this author towards tobacco

See Gen. xxx, 14 et seq., and Song of Songs, vii, 13. The Hebrew word, which means 'love-plants,' is rendered 'mandragora' by both Vulgate and Septuagint. The plant implied by the text was evidently supposed to have (like nearly all narcotics) a preliminary exciting effect.

† 'Plantarum seu Stirpium Icones,' Antwerp, 1581, 2 vols.

that his royal master's well-known opinions on that subject were little influenced by him.

It was not until July 28, 1586, that Francis Drake, with Governor Lane and Walter Raleigh on board, brought to England the first tobacco that reached this country. From the works of Thevet, Lobel and others already quoted, it is clear that no claim can be made for the English as pioneers of the use of tobacco in Europe. The custom of smoking was probably common enough among sailors long before 1586. Attempts to extinguish the practice were made by the 'counterblast' of more than one monarch,* by the excommunications of popes,† and by the denunciations of faculties. But the custom continued to spread, despite penalties, abuses, penal enactments, capital punishment, and, on one occasion at least, the ingenious sentence of being eaten alive. This last unamiable device was the product of the fertile brain of the Russian Patriarch Nicon, and had for its object the maintenance of ecclesiastical discipline. The account of the matter given by the Archdeacon Paul of Aleppo is as follows: 'When the Metropolitan Mira came to Moscow, it happened, in consequence of his many odious deformities and those of his servants and companions, that his Archimandrites, with his pretended relatives and Deacons, were found smoking tobacco; and they were all instantly sent into banishment. He himself only was liberated. . The Patriarch, however,

* Our James I was not the only monarch to denounce tobacco. Christian IV of Denmark employed his physician, Simon Paulus, to compose a work against it. In Russia, where the capital had suffered from several conflagrations originating in the reprehensible habit of smoking in bed, the Grand Duke Michael Federovitch forbade the usage of the herb. For the first offence only the knout was inflicted, but for the second the nose was to be slit, and for the third life was to be forfeited. Similar, though more merciful, enactments received the sanction of the Sultan Amurath IV of Turkey and of Seac Sophi, King of Persia.

+ Urban VIII, the condemner of Galileo, published a bull excommunicating all who introduced tobacco into churches. Later, Clement XI forbade it specifically in St. Peter's at Rome. As this church was alone mentioned in Clement's edict, it was taken by some as rescinding the previous bull in all other churches!

In 1699 a Thesis was sustained before the medical School of the University of Paris' An ex Tabaci usu frequenti vitae summa brevior.' It was decided in the affirmative. The decision may be considered to have less weight, however, as the sustainer smoked throughout the proceedings. For this and other anecdotes, see the chapter on tobacco in the sixth part of the Nouveau Voyage aux Isles de l'Amérique,' by R. P. Labat, 'de l'Ordre des Frères Prècheurs,' Paris, 1720, and subsequent editions.

was still in a great rage against him, . . . . and now sent to have him brought to these savages ["the dog-faced tribe" of Kalmucks] that they might devour him; but he was not to be found, having hid himself.'*

The incident has been regarded as an instance of patriarchal humour.† This interpretation, however, ill accords with what is known of Nicon; and Mitra at least (whose decision may be accepted as authoritative) does not seem to have regarded the matter in this light.

We are, however, passing the limits of the early history of the drug. It had now begun to leave the domain of Materia Medica, or rather it was entering that higher branch of Therapeutics, which concerns itself more with the ordering of men's lives than with the prescription of bottles of physic. In this branch of medicine 'Tabaci folia' will continue to take an important place. Until quite recent times, however, preparations of tobacco were still used in medicine as local applications for the relief of pain, especially in cases of hernia and after operations. For such purposes it has now been replaced by Belladonna and allied drugs.

To one other medicinal use of tobacco, not quite extinct in modern times, we may here briefly refer. The herb was popularly ‡ employed as a disinfectant against such diseases as were supposed to be air-borne. The fumes of the burning leaves were mainly used, but Pepys tells of a second method. On June 7, 1665, when the plague at London was approaching its height, the old gossip describes how much against my will, I did in Drury Lane see two or three houses marked with a red cross upon the doors, and "Lord, have mercy upon us!" writ there. . . . It put me into an ill conception of myself and

* The Travels of Macarius, Patriarch of Antioch, written by his attendant archdeacon, Paul of Aleppo, in Arabic.' Translated by F. C. Belfour. London Oriental Translation Committee, 1879, vol. i, p. 420. Here will also be found an account of the contemporary table customs of this cannibal tribe. The events related took place at some date between the years 1652 and 1658.

† So the late Dean Stanley in his 'Lectures on the History of the Eastern Church,' 1861, lecture xi.

And not only popularly. Isbrand van Diemerbrock, perhaps the best medical writer on the plague of the 17th century, and one of the best of any age, considered that he owed his life to the disinfectant qualities of the tobacco smoked by him during an epidemic.

my smell, so that I was forced to buy some roll-tobacco to smell to and chaw, which took away the apprehension.'

Before we leave our subject we would draw attention to the spread of the use of tobacco not only among white men, but also among some of the lowest existing races, who have had little or no contact with civilised people.* Thus the Australian blacks smoke tobacco freely. The Andamanese use clay pipes, and even the few wild Veddahs surviving in the interior of Ceylon chew tobacco. The primitive races of the Malay Peninsula, Semang, Sakai and Yakun, are all fond of smoking tobacco, and some of them also chew it. In the western parts of New Guinea, the wildest and most untouched tribes yet investigated are smokers, and the custom is evidently not the direct result of white influence. Tobacco smoking on the eastern part of the island has probably been introduced only during the last quarter of a century; and in a few years it will be difficult to map the area into which the habit is of recent importation. It is not necessary to assume European responsibility for the introduction of tobacco, as a species of the plant is found growing wild, and is also cultivated in the very centre of the island. The Tapiro pygmies of Dutch New Guinea are also very fond of smoking. Throughout Africa, again, the use of tobacco is very widely spread, derived doubtless more or less directly from Arab and European sources. Into the Near East tobacco smoking was introduced in the 17th century, the period which also saw the commencement of opium smoking in China. The use of tobacco thus forms the unique instance in modern times of the world-wide adoption of a custom that originates with a barbarous race.

CHARLES SINGER.

The writer has to thank Prof. C. G. Seligman for kindly providing him with most of the anthropological data which follow.

Art. 8.-MODERN FEMINISM AND SEX-ANTAGONISM. 1. The Woman Movement. By Ellen Key. Translated by M. B. Borthwick. London: Putnam, 1912.

2. Woman and Labour. By Olive Schreiner. London: Unwin, 1911.

3. Woman and Economics. By C. P. Gilman. London: Putnam, 1908.

4. Woman and To-morrow. By W. L. George. London: Jenkins, 1913.

5. The Nature of Woman. By J. L. Tayler. London: Fifield, 1912.

6. John and Irene. By W. H. Beveridge. London: Longmans, 1912.

7. Sex Antagonism. By Walter Heape. London: Constable, 1913.

8. Woman in

Modern Society. By Earl Barnes. London: Cassels, 1912.

9. A Survey of the Woman Problem. By Rosa Mayreder. Translated by H. Scheffauer. London: Heinemann, 1913.

IN a lucid little introduction to Ellen Key's latest book, Mr Havelock Ellis, after tracing the broad lines on which the Woman's Movement has developed, suggests that it is now entering a critical period. This view is evidently shared by most of the writers on modern feminism, including some who are not likely to exaggerate the symptoms. The avowed feminist and the declared antifeminist are both, of course, concerned to show that society is in a parlous state, either for want of, or because of, some readjustment of social relations on feminist lines which one desires and the other deprecates. We are too much accustomed to writers whose obvious desire is to 'make our flesh creep,' to pay much attention to jeremiads from either camp; and indeed the vast majority of men and women are sunk in too deep a sense of personal security to be capable of any very keen anxiety as to the future. The more thoughtful, however, and even some who are not usually thoughtful, have been shaken from indifference by recent developments of feminism. The suffrage campaign is only (on the surface) a by-product of feminism, and militancy is (on the surface) merely a