8 SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 



falcon-faced Elizabeth, England's one 

 great queen, for services rendered upon 

 the Spanish Main and in the then New 

 World. 



Columbus was the first European to 

 discover tobacco. When he and his 

 companions saw the Indians smoking it 

 and blowing the smoke through their 

 nostrils, they were as much surprised as 

 they had been at the first sight of land. 

 But they were no more surprised than 

 Ben Jonson, Beaumont, Selden, Fletcher, 

 and Shakespeare when, one stormy night, 

 Sir Walter Raleigh walked into the Mer- 

 maid tavern and, throwing pipes and 

 tobacco upon the table, invited all hands 

 to smoke. Shakespeare thought that it 

 was anticipating things a little to smoke 

 in this world, and that Bacon should have 

 the monopoly of it ; while Ben Jonson 

 " rare Ben," the roundest and fattest and 

 gruffest of men after the first pipeful or 

 two, growled : " Tobacco, I do assert, 

 without fear of contradiction from the 



