"We buy the dryest wood that we can finde, Buying the herb only for the smoke's sake." Smoking was the earliest mode of using tobacco,* (as might be inferred from the epigram) and for a long time the only mode in which it was used in Europe. Certainly in our day it is the most general, and at the same time the most expensive, and although several rivals contend with Sir Walter Ralegh for the praise of having introduced tobacco into England, yet the "bright honour" of having taught his countrymen to imitate the Indians, in this particular, he wears without corrival." Almost all the arguments which have been employed against the use of tobacco as a sternutatory, are more or less applicable to it when used in the way of fumigation. Good old Cotton Mather, who was fully aware of the disadvantages as well as sinfulness of this habit, deprecates it with a qualification at which it is impossible to repress a smile. It savours so much of "beating the Devil round a bush." Thus he says-"May God preserve me from the indecent, ignoble, criminal slavery, to the mean delight of smoking a weed, which I see so many carried away with. And if ever I should smoke it, let me be so wise as to do it, not only with moderation, but also with such employment of my mind, as I may make that action afford me a leisure for !" The effects of smoking on the breath, clothes, hair, and indeed the whole body, are most offensive. What is more overpowering than the stale smell remaining in a room where several persons have been smoking? When the practice is carried to excess, it causes the gums to become lax and flabby, and to recede from the discoloured teeth, which appear long, unsightly, and at length drop out. Dr. Rush, in his "Account of the life and death of Edward Drinker," tells us that that individual lost all his teeth by drawing the hot smoke of tobacco into his mouth. By the Mr. Brodigan, in his treatise on the tobacco plant, quotes Herodotus, Strabo, Pomponius Mela, and Solinus, to prove that tobacco was smoked in very ancient times, but the passages merely go to show that the smoking of herbs was com mon. Venner gives ten precepts on the manner in which tobacco is to be used, and afterwards summarily rehearses the consequences to all who use it contrary to the order and way he sets down; viz. that "it drieth the brain, dimmeth the sight, vitiateth the smell, dulleth and dejecteth both the appitite and stomach, destroyeth the concoction, disturbeth the humours and spirits, corrupteth the breath, induceth a trembling of the limbs, exsiccateth the wind-pipe, lungs, and liver, annoyeth the milt, scorcheth the heart, and causeth the blood to be adusted. Morcover it eliquateth the pinguie substance of the kidneys, and absumeth the geniture. In a word, it overthroweth the spirits, perverteth the understand. ing, and confoundeth the sences with a sudden astonishment and stupiditie of the whole body." Via recta ad longam vitam. p. 404. + Christian Philosopher, p. 136. waste of saliva, and the narcotic power of tobacco, the digestive powers are impaired, and "every kind of dyspeptic symptoms," says Cullen, "are produced."* King James does not forget to note this habit as a breach of good manners. "It is a great vanitie and uncleannesse," says he, "that at the table, a place of respect, of cleanlinesse, of modestie, men should not be ashamed to sit tossing pipes, and puffing of the smoke of tobacco one to another, making the filthy smoke and stinke thereof to exhale athwart the dishes and infect the aire, when very often men that abhorre it, are at their repast." Whether the rock We come now to the subject of chewing. goat, the filthy animal to which we have before adverted, or the tobacco worm, first taught imitative man to masticate tobacco, we are ignorant. One thing, however, is most certain, that of all modes of using it, chewing seems most vulgar and ungentlemanlike, and it is worthy of particular remark, that in our country it is more used in this manner, among the better class of society, than in any other part of the world. All the worst effects which have been ascribed to it in the two former modes of using it, are, with increased severity, imputed to chewing. But tobacco used in this form is said to diminish hunger. "We have been told," says Dr. Leake, "that tobacco, when chewed, is a preservative against hunger; but this is a vulgar error, for in reality it may more properly be said to destroy appetite by the profuse discharge of saliva, which is a powerful dissolving fluid, essential both to appetite and digestion." In the use of the quid, or cud, accidents sometimes happen from swallowing portions, which must needs be very hurtful. Chewers are often taken by surprise, and rather than be detected in the unclean practice, they will, with Spartan fortitude, endure the horrible agonies of swallowing the juice, and sometimes even the quid itself. But we must close our remarks upon this vile habit, which we do by the following quotation from a French writer. "Quant a la coutume de chiquer le tabac, elle est bornée, je crois, à un petit nombre d'individus grossiers, et le plus souvent voués a des habitudes crapuleuses, du moins si j'en juge par ceux que j'y vois livrés." We take the liberty of referring tobacco chewers to Dr. Clark's treatise, (p. 24,) for a quotation he makes from Simon Paulli, physician to the King of Denmark, who wrote a treatise on the danger of using this herb, and also to a note at the foot of the page, both which we are unwilling to repeat. We are almost prepared to assert, that there is scarcely a con Materia Medica, vol. ii. p. 196. In many parts of Europe it is almost impossible for a tobacco chewer to be regarded as a gentleman. ceivable mode of applying tobacco to the human body, which has not been thought of and practised. In former times, it was used by the oculists. Howell says "that it is good to fortify and preserve the sight, the smoak being let in round about the balls once a week, &c." We have even known snuff to be blown into the eyes to cure inflammation. This latter remedy should be somewhat perilous, if what Sauvages relates be true, that a female was thrown into a catalepsy by a small portion of snuff which had accidentally entered her eye. The Rev. S. Wesley, speaking of the abuse of tobacco, intimates an apprehension that the human car will not long remain exempted from its application. "To such a height with some is fashion grown, They feed their very nostrils with a spoon,* One, and but one degree is wanting yet, To make their senseless luxury complete; Some choice regale, useless as snuff and dear, To feed the mazy windings of the ear." Now, as a medicine, at least, it has been used for the ear; for Sir Hans Sloan positively affirms that the "oyl or juice dropped into the ear is good against deafness." Another mode of using tobacco, and not very common we hope, is what is called plugging, that is, thrusting long pellets or rolls of tobacco up the nose, and keeping them there during the night. As a dentifrice it is used in many parts of the world. We have had an opportunity of witnessing this fact in various parts of South America, but especially in Brazil, where respectable women do not scruple openly to use tobacco for this purpose. We have known several very respectable individuals of both sexes in our own country, who use snuff as a tooth powder, and with them its employment was just as much a habit as any other mode of using tobacco. These have been generally West Indians, or persons who have resided much in the West India islands. In some of our southern states, tobacco is much used among the ladies as a dentifrice. Indeed there appears to prevail generally, a very strong opinion, that it is an excellent preservative of the teeth, which is certainly an error; though we think it probable that the stimulus of tobacco, to those who use it in excess, may become in a certain degree necessary to their preservation. Tobacco is truly a leveller. It equalizes the monarch and the hind, and is acceptable to the sage as well as the sailor. "Its smoke," says Thomson, "rising in clouds from the idolatrous altar of the native Mexican, opened the world of spirits to his delirious imagination," while it has "even assisted in extending the boundaries of intellect, by aiding the contemplations of the The fashionable snuff-taker was formerly accustomed to dip up the snuff with a little spoon or ladle, "which ever and anon he gave his nose.' † Natural Hist. Jam. vol. i. p. 147. Christian philosopher." If we advert to the irrefragable proofs of the virulent properties of this plant, and the various arguments which have been urged against its habitual use, we cannot fail to be struck with the extraordinary fact, that so large a portion of mankind should voluntarily struggle through its repugnant qualities, both of taste and effect, until by habit its stimulus grows pleasurable, and the system becomes mithridated against its poison! It would almost seem as if the use of some substance of this class were necessary to the intellectual and physical economy of man, since no nation nor age, of which we have any account, has been found without. Of the various masticatories which have been in general use, if we except opium, tobacco is unquestionably the most pernicious. Although its moderate use may not shorten life, or prove perceptibly hurtful to health, yet its excessive employment certainly generates many formidable. disorders, particularly of the nerves and stomach, and subjects its votary to innumerable inconveniences and sufferings. Our space will not permit us to expatiate any further; and we shall therefore conclude our article by relating from Rush a very interesting anecdote of Dr. Franklin, which places the commonsense view of this matter in the strongest possible light. A few months before Franklin's death, he declared to one of his friends, that he had never used tobacco in the course of his long life, and that he was disposed to believe there was not much advantage to be derived from it, for that he had never known a man who used it, who advised him to follow his example. ART. VII.-Voyages and Discoveries of the Companions of Columbus. By WASHINGTON IRVING: Philadelphia: Carey & Lea: 1831. WHEN We noticed, three years since, a former production of Mr. Irving, we took occasion to express an opinion of its merits, which has been fully confirmed. No work of the present era appears to have afforded more general and unmingled gratification to its readers, than his Life of Columbus; and he has received, in the approbation, not only of his own countrymen, but of Europeans, the most gratifying reward an author can desire. The fame which he had acquired, and that most justly, by the happy works of fiction in which he was introduced to the public, is now changed into one of higher character; and he becomes entitled to take his stand among those writers who have done more than amuse the fancy, or even gratify the heart. He is to be classed with the historians of great events; for if the period of which he has treated is limited, or the persons whose actions he has described are not numerous, yet the one included within it, short as it was, circumstances that have produced an effect which long ages have not always surpassed in importance or wonderful consequences; and the others embrace individuals whose actions have more deeply affected the human race than many of the revolutions of great and populous nations. Having these feelings in regard to the former work of Mr. Irving, we open the present volume with mingled apprehension and pleasure. We rejoice that we are to follow again the same guide in adventurous voyages among the clustering Antilles; but we almost fear that the narrative may want much of that interest, novelty, and beauty, which make the story of Columbus among the most attractive ever recorded. The followers of the Admiral were, it is true, brave, adventurous, gallant men; the skies beneath which they sailed were as blue, clear, and tranquil as when he first admired their delightful serenity; the islands they visited were as flowery and as fertile as when they first blessed the sight of the enterprising sailor; if the iron hand of Christian civilization had, here and there, broken down the gentle and benevolent spirit of the naked beings who wandered through a life of inglorious bliss, in their remote and peaceful regions, there were yet haunts undiscovered where they might roam in undisturbed security-there were yet bays over which they might dart unobstructed their light canoes-green and shady forests beneath which they might chant their songs, and rich valleys not yet searched for gold. But yet with all this, he, the master spirit, is no longer among the voyagers. There is no longer the novelty of a vast discovery. The way has been opened by the daring pioneer, and we are now only to follow in the plain track his genius conceived, discovered, and marked out. can merely watch the footsteps of those who followed the triumphal chariot; the hero of the ovation has already passed along, and our eyes are still dazzled with his splendour-our minds are still filled with admiration of his genius, his enterprise, his undaunted and noble spirit. We are to turn from those loftier efforts of human intellect and perseverance, which mark, now and then, a human being, as a beacon in the midst of his fellow men, to the more common, though it is true, the bold and spirited adventures which attend the fortunes of many in the career of life. The story of these adventures is indeed full of interest, but it is an interest less in degree; and we can no more venture to compare it with that which attends the actions and fortunes of him who seeks and finds a new world, than we can compare the patient inquirer, who nightly searches through his telescope for new stars in the vast firmament, with him who proclaimed and proved the theory of the universe |