144 ST NICOTINE 



smoke, and, swallowing it, it came out by his nostrils and 

 blinded him. As soon as he recovered breath he cried out, 

 ' Away with it ! Oh, the hog ! Oh, my stomach ! My 

 stomach turns ! ' This was Napoleon's first and last ex- 

 perience of smoking. Then let those whom St Nicotine 

 favours thankfully own her benign sway and be comforted. 

 The placid oriental, when his wives rave, or affliction 

 smites him, will stroke his beard — if he have one — and 

 thank Allah for the good gift 



Which on the Moslem's ottoman divides. 

 His hours, and rivals opium and his brides. 



An old Persian legend, brought to light by Lieutenant 

 Walpole, tells the story of a virtuous youth distraught at 

 the loss of a loving wife. A holy man looks tenderly upon 

 the disconsolate one, and tells him of a balm for his 

 affliction. ' Go to thy wife's tomb, son of sorrow,' says the 

 anchorite, 'and there thou wilt find a weed. Pluck it, 

 place it in a reed, and put fire to it, then inhale the smoke 

 thereof. This will be to thee wife and mother, father and 

 brother, and, above all, will be a wise counsellor, and 

 teach thy soul wisdom and thy spirit joy.' The Homeric 

 strain of this Eastern sage breathes of implicit faith in his 

 native Shiraz tobacco. For doubtless he, a dweller in 



, . . . the land where the cypress and myrtle 

 Are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime ; 

 Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the turtle, 

 Now melts into sorrow, now maddens to crime, 



had often experienced its influence on a wounded heart. 

 Indeed, the history and associations of the plant, from its 

 wild Indian home to the remotest East, are full of romance 

 of more than ordinary interest. For, like most things 

 transatlantic, whether products of the soil or of the brain, it 



