BRATHWAIT S SMOAKING AGE. 0< 



himself to Hercules, whose only arms were a bag and 

 a club when he went to war ; he says, " I have armed 

 myself with a boxe for his bagge, and a pipe for his 

 club : a box to conserve my tobacco, and a pipe to use 

 it ; by these two, God willing, to overcome many 

 maladies." He narrates many that may be so cured, 

 and imagines that physicians might be done without 

 in all cases of defluxion and catarrh " if they knew 

 the vertue of tobacco ; " concluding by decrying the 

 imputations against it, as — 



" Forged by scurvie, lend, unlearned leicbes, 

 As time hath taught and practise thatt all tryis. 

 Tobacco neither altereth health nor hew, 

 Ten thousand thousands know that it is true." 



One of the most curious and rare books which 

 the taste for " the Indian novelty " generated, is 

 Eichard Brathwait's little volume, bearing the follow- 

 ing title : — The Smoaking Age, or, the Man in the 

 Mist : icith the Life and Death of Tobacco. Dedicated to 

 those three renowned and imparallel'd heroes, Captain 

 Whiff c, Captain Pipe, and Captain Snuffe ; to whom 

 the Author wisheth as much content as this smoaking 

 age can afford them. At the signe of Teare-nose, 1G17. 

 The following is an analysis of its contents : 



An exceedingly well executed frontispiece by Mar- 

 shall, representing a tobacconist's shop, faces the title, 

 which we here engrave. The shop is open to the 

 street, in accordance with ancient usage ; and has a 

 pent- house of boards, from which hangs a double hoop, 

 used to hold pipes ; " strong water," glasses, and 



