SOCIAL AND ESTHETIC VIEW. 177 



smoker must have a compartment in which lie 

 enjoys the free exercise of his privilege, even if he 

 have it all to himself and a dozen people are rush- 

 ing about the platform, looking in vain for room, 

 the guard's whistle already sounding. Tobacco is 

 a powerful drug, administered through the respira- 

 tory organs, that is, through the atmosphere ; and 

 as we breathe one another's atmosphere, as it were, 

 in common stock, the smoker administers his drug 

 to all about him, whether they wish it or not. The 

 indifference or apathy with regard to the comfort 

 of others is one of the most remarkable effects of 

 tobacco. No other drug will produce anything 

 like it. The opium-eater does not compel you to 

 eat opium with him : the drunkard does not com- 

 pel you to drink. The smoker compels you to 

 smoke, — nay, more, to breathe the smoke he has 

 just discharged from his own mouth." 



M Tobacco demoralizes,'" says Dr. Parker. " It 

 makes a man careless about his hair ; he lets his 

 nails go uncleaned ; his clothes are soiled ; in a 

 word, he is dirty." 



A writer in Blackwood asserts " that tobacco is 

 the favorite filth of every savage life within the 

 circumference of the globe ; that it fills the atmos- 

 phere of the continent with a perpetual stench ; 

 . . . that it is in its own nature the filthiest, most 

 foolish, dullest, and most disgusting practice on 

 the face of the earth." 



