ANTIQUITY OF TOBACCO-SMOKING 129 



gone, and no one knew whither. Search was made for it 

 high and low, in likely and unlikely places, but all in vain. 

 Then did they remember their renowned Oka, the wise. 

 They appealed to him for counsel, and made him acquainted 

 with the cause of their grief. He, shrewd man, questioned 

 the household, and on learning that a poor fellow living in 

 the neighbourhood had been seen smoking a pipe of great 



A JAPANESE PIPE. 



value he found out the truth respecting it in the following 

 ingenious manner. But here, in order to better understand 

 the story, it will be well to explain the Japanese method of 

 smoking. It is the custom of each smoker to roll the 

 tobacco between his fingers into a ball of the exact size 

 required to fit the bowl of the pipe, so that when turning 

 the pipe sideways to light it at the live charcoal it should 

 not fall out ; after every two or three whiffs a fresh ball is 

 introduced. The smoker will thus occupy himself by the 

 hour listlessly making fresh ones while he smokes, utterly 

 oblivious it may be to what he is doing, but from constant 

 practice his nimble fingers with automatic precision invariably 

 makes the tiny ball of the size needed to fix it securely in the 

 bowl. And now, let us hearken to the words of Oka, and 

 learn of the sage how he recovered the lost pipe and 

 brought the culprit to justice. ' Unseen by the suspected 

 one, I found out a way of watching him while seated on his 

 mat idly toying with a pipe. Snugly hidden behind a paper 

 screen I made slits in it for my eyes, for thought I, if 

 the pipe be not his own he will make up tobacco balls too 

 large or too small to fit the bowl, then shall I know the 



9 



