182 A TOUa ROUND MT GAKDEN. 



but all that will go off a little ; and, with time, they wiU be- 

 come so accustomed to it as only to experience these accidents 

 now and then, only when they smoke bad or too strong to- 

 bacco, or when the stomach shall be out of order, or in five 

 or sis other cases. 



" Those who take it in powder will sneeze, will feel slightly 

 unwell at first, wiU lose their fine sense of smell, and will 

 establish in their noses a sort of perpetual vesicatory." 



" Ah 1 then I suppose it smells very nice \" 



" No ! on the contrary, it smells very disagreeably. My 

 plan is, that we sell this very dear, and reserve the monopoly 

 of it." 



" My good friend," the man senseless enough to hold such 

 language would have been answered, " nobody will dispute 

 the privilege with you of selling a thing of which there will 

 be no buyers. You would have a much better chance if you 

 would open a shop, and write over it — 



KICKS ARE SOID HERE) 



Or,— 



HORSEWHIPPINGS SOLD HERE, WHOLESALE AND RETAIL. 



You would find more customers than for your venomous 

 herb.'' 



Well, you see it was the second speaker who would have 

 been in the wrong; the tobacco speculation has perfectly 

 succeeded. The kings of France did not write satires against 

 tobacco, they did not cut off people's noses, they did not con- 

 fiscate snuff-boxes. Far from that ; they sold tobacco, they 

 established a tax upon noses, and made presents to poets of 

 snuff-boxes, with their portraits on the Uds and diamonds all 

 around them. This little trade brings them in I don't know 

 how many millions every year. 



Fragon, the physician of Louis XIV., was to maintain a 

 thesis against snuff in the schools ; being ill, his place was 

 supplied by a brother medicus, who read the thesis — taking 

 enormous quantities of snuff all the while ! 



The poet SanteuU died almost suddenly, after having drunk 

 a glass of wine, into which some snuff had been put. 



Potatoes had much more difficulty in establishing them- 

 selves than tobacco had, and still have adversaries. 



