SOCIAL GOSSIP ABOUT THE WEED i8i 



off a piece of the cable with which he filled his pipe and 

 drew down the smoke thereof as if it were the precious weed. 

 He speaks, also, of an Irishman who falling ill was not 

 allowed his usual pipe of tobacco. He submitted for some 

 time, but he became so low and so melancholy that he 

 could take nothing but a little tobacco, which was at last 

 permitted him, with the result that in a short time he 

 recovered perfect health. * I have known,' says Rochefort, 

 * several persons who, not content with smoking in the day, 

 went to bed with their pipes in their mouths. Others who 

 have risen in the night to take tobacco with as much 

 pleasure as they would have received in drinking Alicant or 

 Greek wine.' Profligate smokers such as these deserve no 

 encouragement or sympathy ; they rank in the class of the 

 besotted. 



Rarely do we meet with more sympathetic words in 

 favour of the weed than in Mission's Memoies of Travels 

 over England, v/hich he published in 1697. Tobacco- 

 smoking, he says, was commonly practised both by men 

 and women, particularly in country places. His 

 observations led him to remark that smoking makes the 

 generality of Englishmen taciturn, thoughtful, and, alas, 

 melancholy ; he adds that the use of tobacco ' not only 

 breeds profound theologists, but also begets moral 

 philosophers.' And in a sonnet, which bears some 

 resemblance to the verses of George Wither, he shows us 

 that he had himself imbibed something of the melancholy 

 and philosophic spirit he speaks of. The lines run as 

 follows : 



Sweet smoking pipe ; bright glowing stove, 



Companion still of my retreat, 

 Thou dost my gloomy thoughts remove, 



And purge my brain with gentle heat. 



