ANTIQUITY OF TOBACCO-SMOKING 109 



to have taken theirs, so original; and lastly, the preparation 

 of the dried leaves, which are merely rubbed to pieces and 

 then put into the pipe, so peculiar that they could not 

 possibly have derived all this from America by way of 

 Europe, especially as India, where the practice of smoking 

 is not so general, intervenes between Persia and China.' 

 But surely this reasoning is merely an example of drawing 

 inference from insufficient data; from what at best bears 

 the appearance only of probability. 



The learned botanist, Meyen, speaking of China in 

 relation to the habit of smoking, deals with another and 

 more pertinent aspect of the question. ' It has long been 

 the opinion,' he remarks, ' that the use of tobacco, as well 

 as its culture, was peculiar to the people of America ; but 

 this is now proved to be incorrect by our present more 

 exact acquaintance with China and India. The consump- 

 tion of tobacco in the Chinese Empire is of immense 

 extent, and the practice seems to be of great antiquity, for 

 on very old sculptures I have observed the very same 

 tobacco-pipes which are still used. Besides, we know the 

 plant which furnishes the Chinese tobacco ; it is even 

 said^to grow wild in the East Indies. It is certain that 

 this tobacco plant of eastern Asia is quite different from 

 the American species.' The tobacco grown in China is 

 very light in colour and almost tasteless, possessing a very 

 small amount of the essential oil, one or two per cent, as 

 against seven or eight per cent, yielded by the Virginian 

 plant. Experiment, however, has brought to light the fact 

 that climate and soil are really answerable for all the 

 difference between the two kinds ; that the Nicotiana 

 tahacum of America for example, when transplanted into 

 Syrian soil, has after a few years' cultivation lost its marked 

 characteristics and become a light-coloured, mild tobacco, 



