378 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
[204 S, Ne 19,, May 10.56. 
“Kat queis Bovdcvoducba Kal eypawapevs Ore iva exn 6 
Wldras Ta mpovéuta avTov Kara TOvS Kavovas, Kat Ta pyTa TOY 
aylov, kat Tv Oelay Tpadyy, kat Ta mpaktiKa TOY TuVddwr.” — 
‘onc. Florent., sep. XXv., Versus finem. 
J. SANSOM. 
SONG ON TOBACCO. 
(278. i. 115. 182. 258, 320.) 
The following version of this popular song, the 
earliest yet discovered, is from a MS. of the early 
part of the seventeenth century, in the possession 
of Mr. J. Payne Collier.* It has the initials “ G. 
W.” (i.e. George Withers?) at the end. Like 
Milton, Withers is said to have indulged in the 
luxury of smoking ; and many of his evenings in 
Newgate (during his long imprisonment), when 
weary of numbering his steps, or telling the panes 
of glass, were solaced with “ meditations over a 
pipe,” not without a grateful acknowledgment of 
God’s mercy in thus wrapping up “a blessing in 
a weed.” 
“ Why should we so much despise, 
So good and wholesome an exercise, 
As early and late to meditate: 
Thus think, and drink tobacco. 
“ The earthen pipe so lily white, 
Shows that thou art a mortal wight, 
Even such, and gone with a small touch: 
Thus think, and drink tobacco. 
“ And when the smoke ascends on high, 
Think on the worldly vanity 
Of worldly stuff, ’tis gone with a puff; 
Thus think, and drink tobacco. 
“ md when the pipe is foul within, 
Think how the soul’s defiled with sin, ' 
To purge with fire it doth require: 
Thus think, and drink tobacco. 
“ Lastly, the ashes left behind, 
May daily show to move the mind, 
That to ashes and dust return we must: 
Thus think, and drink tobacco.” 
A printed broadside of this song, dated 1670, 
is still in existence. It has the tune at the top, 
and corresponds with the preceding in all material 
points, excepting the first stanza, which runs thus: 
“ The Indian weed withered quite, 
Grown at noon, cut down at night, 
Shows thy decay, —all flesh is hay: 
Thus think, then drink tobacco.” 
Drinking tobacco was another term for smoking 
it:— 
“The smoke of tobacco (the which Dodoneus called 
rightly Henbane of Peru) drwnke and drawen by a pipe, 
filleth the membranes of the braine, and astonisheth and 
filletth many persons with such joy and pleasure, and 
sweet losse of senses, that they can by no means be 
without it.” — The Perfuming of Tobacco, and the great 
Abuse committed in it, 1611. . 
* Printed in my Little Book of Songs and Ballads from 
Ancient Musick Books MS., and printed, 8yo., 1851. 
The version quoted by Mr. W. H. Husx from 
The Aviary, or Magazine of British Melody, be- 
ginning : 
“ Tobacco’s but an Indian weed,” 
was first printed (as far as I have observed) in 
Wit and Mirth, or Pills to Purge Melancholy, 
1707, vol. i. p. 315. The burden in this latter 
copy reads: 
“ Think of this, and take tobacco.” 
Epwarp F, Rimsautr. 
The song on tobacco quoted in your last num- 
ber is but a clumsy paraphrase of that ballad fi 
printed in 1672, in a minor “ Counterblaste,” en- 
titled Two Broadsides against Tobacco: it was 
afterwards reprinted in a Paper of Tobacco, pub- 
lished in 1837, and now out of print, and again in 
the Book of English Songs, where another version, 
differing again from your correspondent’s, is also 
given. You will notice in the original, how much 
more smooth the rhyme is, and, although quaint, 
is a much better piece of poetical moralisation 
than its copy: 
“ The Indian weed wither’d quite, 
Green at noon, cut down at night, 
Shews thy decay, 
All flesh is hay, 
Thus think, then drink* tobacco. , 
“ The pipe that is so lily white 
Shews thee to be a mortal wight, 
Even as such 
Gone at a touch, 
Thus think, then drink tobacco. 
« And when the smoke ascends on high, 
Think thou behold’st the vanity 
Of worldly stuff, 
Gone at a puff; 
Thus think, then drink tobacco. 
“ And when the pipe grows foul within, 
Think on thy soul defiled with sin, 
And of the fire 
It doth require ; 
Thus think, then drink tobacco. 
“The ashes that are left behind, 
May serve to put thee still in mind, 
That unto dust 
Return thou must; 
Thus think, then drink tobacco. 
J. BertRaND Payne. 
Sudbury. 
“ THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 
(24 S, i. 268.) 
To the first Query of Anon, whether a version 
of the Commandments, such as described by Dr. 
NG sing Say pai ihe 4) eee 
* It may be as well to add that drinking tobacco was 
the ancient term given to what we now term smoking; 
this had more significance then, as the smoke was swal- 
lowed and ejected through the nostrils, in the same man- 
ner as the modern Spaniards smoke their cigarettos, 
