STRAY LEAVES FROM THE WEED 153 



a literary warfare over the virtues and vices of St Nicotine, 

 which lasted intermittently down to the present day. Mr. 

 Solly, of St. Thomas's Hospital, in the middle of last century 



DUC DE SULLY 



strove valiantly in the columns of the Lancet to get up 

 a crusade against smoking. All the leading members of the 

 medical profession took part in the affray ; irrefragable statis- 

 tics were piled up one upon the other as ramparts from be- 

 hind which Mr. Solly proclaimed that there was death in the 

 pipe ; and the rapid degeneracy of the human race, to him 

 everywhere apparent, was to be regarded as the inevitable 

 consequence of indulgence in the pernicious weed. Had 



