STRAY LEAVES FROM THE WEED 163 



next offer, saying he was mistaken and deceived, and 

 therefore no reason he should keep the bargain. This was 

 often the case with the Farmers of the Customs.' 



There is a document in the State Archives which throws 

 a curious side-light on the King's ideas of statecraft. The 

 settlers in Guiana had become tobacco-planters, and 

 required a trade-charter with this country. A charter was 

 granted them, in which a clause was inserted to the effect 

 that one-tenth of the tobacco grown there should go to the 

 King. Thus, in a roundabout way, the King became a 

 tobacco merchant. 



The concern which the King had professed for the 

 1 many mean persons ' of decayed fortune in debt for 

 tobacco had not resulted in helping them out of their 

 difficulties, but rather the contrary. From Aubrey we 

 learn that its cost had risen to the value of silver. He 

 says, ' I have heard some of our old yeomen neighbours 

 say that when they went to Malmesbury or Chippenham 

 market they culled out their biggest shillings to lay in the 

 scales against the tobacco. Now (1680) the Customes of 

 it are the greatest his majestic hath.' In various 

 documents of the period, tobacco is mentioned amongst 

 the most expensive luxuries. Even in Elizabeth's reign its 

 price ranged from IDS. to :8s. a pound, according to the 

 quality. 



Meanwhile, jovial spirits were amusing themselves with 

 a lively paper warfare over the virtues and vices of the rare 

 Indian plant that, according to the King, had bewitched 

 them. Early in the fray (1602), appeared anonymously a 

 booklet entitled, Work for Chimney Sweepers, or a 

 Warning to Tobacconists, calling the smoker's attention to 

 the necessity for securing the services of one of those 

 useful members of the community. At that time it was 



