TOBACCO 1019 



odours, and especially of tobacco. If a fresh green leaf of tobacco be crushed between 

 the fingers, it emits merely the herbaceous smell common to many plants ; but if it 

 be triturated in a mortar along "with a little quick-lime or caustic potash, it will 

 immediately exhale the peculiar odur of. snuff. Analysis shows the presence of 

 ammonia in this plant, and fermentation serves further to generate free ammonia in it. 

 Tobacco contains a great quantity of an azotised principle, which by fermentation 

 produces abundance of ammonia ; the first portions of which saturate the acid juices 

 of the plant, and the rest serve to volatilise its odorous principles. The salt waber is 

 useful chiefly in moderating the fermentation, and preventing it from passing into the 

 putrefactive stage ; just as salt is sometimes added to saccharine worts in tropical 

 countries, to temper the fermentative action. The sea-salt, which contains some 

 muriate of lime, tends to keep the tobacco moist, and is therefore preferable to pure 

 chloride of sodium for this purpose. Some tobacconists mix molasses with the salt 

 sauce, and ascribe to this addition the violet colour of the macouba snuff of Martinique ; 

 and others add a solution of extract of liquorice. 



The fermented leaves, being next stripped of their middle ribs by the hands of 

 children, are sorted anew, and the large ones are set apart for making cigars. Most 

 of the tobaccos on sale in our shops are mixtures of different growths : one kind of 

 smoking tobacco, for example, consists of 70 parts of Maryland and 30 of meagre 

 Virginia ; and one kind of snuff consists of 80 parts of Virginia and 30 parts of either 

 Mumesfort or "Warwick. The Maryland is a very light tobacco, in thin yellow leaves ; 

 that of Virginia is in large brown leaves, unctuous or somewhat gluey on the surface, 

 having a smell somewhat like the figs of Malaga ; that of Havannah is in brownish 

 light leaves, of an agreeable and rather spicy smell ; it forms the bestcigars. The 

 Carolina tobacco is less unctuous than the Virginian ; but in the United States it 

 ranks next the Maryland. The shag tobacco is dried to the proper point upon sheets 

 of copper. 



Tobacco is cut into what is called ' shag tobacco' by knife-edged chopping stamps. 

 For grinding the tobacco-leaves into snuff, conical mortars are employed, somewhat 

 like that used by the Hindoos for grinding sugar-canes ; but the sides of the snuff- 

 mill have sharp ridges from the top to near the bottom. 



Mr. L. W. Wright introduced a tobacco-cutting machine, which bears a close 

 resemblance to the well-known machines with revolving knives for cutting straw into 

 chaff. The tobacco, after being squeezed into cakes, is placed upon a smooth bed 

 within a horizontal trough, and pressed by a follower and screws to keep it compact. 

 These cakes are progressively advanced upon the bed, or fed in, to meet the revolving 

 blades. The speed of the feeding-screw determines the degree of fineness of the 

 sections or particles into which the tobacco is cut. 



Snuff is sometimes largely drugged with pearlashes, and thereby rendered pungent, 

 and absorbent of moisture. 



Eefuse leaves and roots, such as those of senna, rhubarb, and the like, after their 

 medicinal properties have been extracted in the manufacture of infusions, extracts, and 

 tinctures, by the druggists, were formerly ground, coloured with burnt sienna or yellow 

 ochre, made pungent with ammonia, and then sold in large quantities to the snuff-manu- 

 facturers. We have reasons for believing that this fraud is but rarely practised now. 

 According to the analysis of Posset and Reimann, 10,000 parts of tobacco- 

 leaves contain 6 of the peculiar chemical principle nicotine; 1 of nicotianine ; 287 of 

 slightly bitter extractive ; 174 of gum, mixed with a little malic acid ; 26'7 of a green 

 resin ; 26 of vegetable albumen ; 104 - 8 of a substance analogous to gluten ; 51 of 

 malic acid ; 12 of malate of ammonia ; 4'8 of sulphate of potass ; 6'3 of chloride of 

 potassium ; 9 - 5 of potassa, which has been combined with malic and nitric acids ; 

 16'6 of phosphate of lime ; 24 - 2 of lime, which had been combined with malic acid ; 8'8 

 of silica ; 496'9 of fibrous or ligneous matter ; traces of starch ; and 88 - 28 of water. 



In ' Silliman's Journal,' vol. vii. p. 2, a chemical examination of tobacco is given by 

 Dr. Covell, which shows its components to have been but imperfectly represented in 

 the above German analysis. He found, 1, gum ; 2, a viscid slime, equally soluble in 

 water and alcohol, and precipitable from both by subacetate of lead; 3, tannin ; 4, 

 gallic acid; 5, chlorophyll (leaf-green); 6, a green pulverulent matter, which dis- 

 solves in boiling water, but falls down again when the water cools ; 7, a yellow oil, 

 possessing the smell, taste, and poisonous qualities of tobacco ; 8, a large quantity of 

 a pale yellow resin ; 9, nicotine ; 10, a white substance, analogous to morphia, soluble 

 in hot, but hardly in cold, alcohol ; 11, a beautiful orange-red dye-stuff, soluble only in 

 acids : it deflagrates in the fire, and seems to possess neutral properties ; 1 2, nicotinine. 

 A strict royal monopoly exists, or existed, in Austria Proper, France. Sardinia, the 

 Duchies of Parma and Lucca, and the Grand-Duchy of Tuscany, and in Portugal, 

 Spain, Naples, and the States of the Church ; the license to manufacture is periodically 

 eold to companies, which regulate the prices of tobacco as they please. It will be 



