NAECOTIC PLANTS AND STIMULANTS — SAFFOED. 389 



TOBACCO. 



(Plates 1 and 2.) 



Tobacco is first mentioned in the account of Columbus's discovery 

 of the New World. In the narrative published by Navarrete, under 

 the date of November 6, 1492, is the following entry : 



Last night, says the admiral, came the two men whom he had sent to observe 

 the interior of the island, and they told him how they had walked 12 leagues 

 to a village of 50 houses. * * * On the road the two Christians encountered 

 many people proceeding to their villages, men and women, holding in their 

 hands a firebrand and herbs which they were accustomed to take in their incense 

 burners. 



In a footnote on the same page is added : 



In the Historia general de las Indias which he wrote, Bishop Casas refers 

 with greater detail to this occurrence. " These two Christians met on the road 

 (says he) many people who were proceeding to their villages, women and men, 

 always the men with a firebrand in their hands and certain herbs to take in 

 their incense burners, which are dry herbs wrapped in a certain leaf, also dry, 

 after the manner of a musket made of paper which the boys make at the feast 

 of Pascua del Espiritu Santo; and having lighted one end of it, at the other 

 they suck or inhale, or receive within with the breath, that smoke, with which 

 the body is soothed and which almost intoxicates, so that they do not feel 

 fatigue. These muskets, or whatever we shall call them, they call tabacos. 

 I knew Spaniards on this island of Hispaniola who were accustomed to taking 

 them, and, being reproached for so doing because it was a vice, they replied 

 that they could not stop the habit. I know not what savor or benefit they found 

 in them. Here may be seen the origin of our cigars. Who would have ventured 

 to say at that time that their consumption and use would one day become so 

 common and general and that upon this new and strange vice there would be 

 established one of the fattest revenues of the State? "^ 



USE OF TOBACCO BY THE MEiXICANS. 



By the ancient Mexicans tobacco was regarded as a sacred or 

 magic herb. It was used in their religious rites and in ceremonies 

 of various kinds in the form of incense. They also inhaled its 

 smoke and chewed its leaves together with lime. In the Nahuatl 

 language it was called yetl, as prepared for their fumigations it 

 was called picietl ; and the leaf of green tobacco together with lime, 

 prepared for chewing was called tenexietl (from tenextli, lime, and 

 3^etl, tobacco). The last name is often modified into other forms, 

 varying even in the writings of a single author, as tenegiete, tene- 

 chiete, etc., the Nahuatl X having the sound of the English SH 

 (which is absent from the Spanish language), and the Spaniards 

 having a tendency to drop the terminal L of Nahuatl words. 



The plant itself, Nlcotiana tahacum^ was described by Dr. Nicolas 

 Monardes of Seville, in 1574, and highly recommended by him for its 



1 Navarrete, Colleccion de los Viages de Descubrimientos, que hicieron por mar los 

 Espanoles desde fines del siglo XV. Tomo. 1. Viages de Colon : Almirantazgo de Cas- 

 tilla. pp. 50-51. 1825. 



73839°— SM 1916 26 



