TOBACCO IN RELATION TO HEALTH 51 



770,000,000 lbs. — and that the average value was 24s. a 

 quarter, making a total value of _;,^33,ooo,ooo. Thus we 

 see how nearly the sum expended upon tobacco-smoking 

 approaches to the sum spent upon wheat. Comparing the 

 quantities of the two commodities we can only say, so 

 much the better for the consumer of wheat, who obtains in 

 weight about fifteen times more of bread than he could 

 purchase of tobacco for the same sum — bearing in mind 

 that wheat requires 45 per cent, of water for its conversion 

 into bread. And herein lies the secret of the large 

 consumption of tobacco : bread is so cheap, the poor man 

 can afford to indulge in a little more of his comforter than 

 he could formerly. 



Commenting upon the vast increase in the consumption 

 of tobacco, the Chancellor of the Exchequer was so mindful 

 of the public interest as to give expression to his matured 

 conviction that ' Everything spent on tobacco by those who 

 have enough to eat is waste.' Acknowledging himself to 

 be a non-smoker, and perhaps prejudiced, he would only 

 appeal to smokers whether this was not waste : 'It is 

 calculated,' said Sir Michael, ' by the Customs authorities 

 that no less a value than ;^i,ooo,ooo is literally thrown 

 into the gutter in the shape of the ends of cigarettes and 

 cigars. It is all the better for the revenue, but I think it 

 may be a subject of consideration for smokers.' 



Looked at broadly, all such considerations are relative — 

 relative to the numbers who smoke and to their ability to 

 spend. Naturally we turn to our neighbours across the silver 

 streak and ask what they are doing ; are they more frugal 

 than we are in the use of the weed ? Germany, always to 

 the fore where painstaking and close attention to minutia 

 is required, tells us that Hjolland uses the leaf at the rate 

 of a trifle over 7 lbs. per head of her population ; Austria, 



