240 



PREPARATION OF THE TOBACCO. 



scale. But this, like many kindred theories, is quite a mis- 

 take. In this country there exist large snuff-mills worked by 

 steam power, and in Scotland there is one water-mill which 

 is driven by a water-power of the strength of thirty horses. 

 The grinding of snutf is at present carried on much as it was 

 one hundred years ago. The apparatus, although effective, 





SNUFF-MILL A CENTURY AGO. 



is very primitive, and would lead one to suppose that mechan- 

 ical ingenuity had wholly neglected to trouble itself about 

 improving that branch of machinery. 



"All kinds of snuff are made from tobacco leaves, or 

 tobacco stalks, either separate or mixed. This in the first 

 instance goes through a kind of fermentation, and, like the 

 basis of soup at the modern hotels, forms, as it were, the 

 stock from which all the varieties in flavor and appearance 

 are produced by special treatment and flavoring. Of course 

 the strength and pungency of the snuff will depend a good 

 deal upon the richness of the tobacco originally put aside for 

 it. About one thousand pounds of tobacco would form an 

 ordinary batch of snuff. The duty on this woiild amount to 

 about 150, and this has to be paid before the tobacco is 

 removed from the bonded warehouse. Having got his heap 

 of material ready, the snuff maker moistens it, then places it 

 in a warm room and covers it over with warm cloths coddles 

 it, as it were, to make it comfortable, so that the cold air 

 cannot get to it and the heap is then lef C for three or four 

 weeks, as the case may be, to ferment. 



" In France, where, under the Imperial regime, snuff-making 

 was a Government monopoly, the tobacco was allowed to 

 ferment for twelve or eighteen months ; and in the principal 

 factory (that at Strasburg) might have been seen scores of 



