1859.] REVIEWS. 307 



their taste for smoking, but to be acquainted with the history 

 and singular associations of this plant, its extensive use, and 

 properties. We believe no one has satisfactorily answered the 

 question '' Cui bono V respecting tobacco, but as far as concerns 

 the revenue of our country, it is a singular fact that the enor- 

 mous sum of five millions and a quarter sterling is paid for duty 

 on tobacco and snuff, the end of which is smoke, dust, and 

 ashes. The benefit or advantage to the human system by 

 smoking tobacco or inhaling snuff has been seriously questioned, 

 and we doubt whether more can be said in its favour than that 

 it is a luxury to those who like it. 



It appears that tobacco was first used, both for smoking and 

 suufiing, more for its smell, aroma, or odour, than for its taste, 

 and that smoking did not at first consist of drawing the smoke 

 into the mouth and puffing it out again, but its exit was 

 through the nostrils. A smoker, therefore, to be original, 

 should, after filling his mouth with smoke, let it escape through 

 his nose."^ 



Mr. Fairholt has divided his work into six chapters: — 1. The 

 Tobacco-plant. 2. Tobacco in America. 3. Tobacco in Europe, 

 and its Literary Associations. 4. Tobacco, Pipes, Cigars, and the 

 Smoker's Paraphernalia. 5. Snuff and Snuff-Boxes. 6. The 

 Culture, Manufacture, and Consumption of Tobacco. 



He tells us in the first chapter that there are forty varieties of 

 the Tobacco-plant noted by botanists, who class them all among 

 the Boianacece and narcotic poisons, and he says, " The Atropa 

 Belladonna, or Deadly Nightshade, is a member of the family, 

 and it may be of use to the nervous to know that the common 

 Potato is in the same category, and that though tobacco will 

 produce a violent poison, Nicotine, by the chemical condensa- 

 tion of a large quantity, in a similar manner the Potato-plant 

 and leaves give us Solanine, an acrid narcotic poison, two 

 grains of which given to a rabbit produced paralysis and death 

 in two hours. Traces of this are also found in the healthy 

 tubers. It is therefore evident that in a moderate manner we 

 may equally smoke our tobacco or eat our potato as regardless 

 of the horrors that chemistry would seem at first to disclose, as 

 when enjoying the flavour of the bitter almond, which we know 

 to be owing to the presence of prussic acid.'' 



* Minshew calls the keeper of a tobacco-shop " Fumivendnlus." 



