Tobacco's World Triumph 51 



sexes of all ages. All Chinese ladies smoke tobacco 

 through a water-pipe. After the lady visitor has 

 been asked her name, her age, the number of people 

 in her house, etc., the hostess asks her if she will * eat 

 tobacco.' In Siam men, women, and children smoke 

 with equal zest. Little dots of humanity run about 

 at their play, unconcernedly puffing a cigarette, with 

 another held in reserve behind the ear, as a City 

 clerk holds his pen. 



The Burmese are taught to smoke as to eat. A 

 Burmese mother takes the cheroot from her mouth 

 and puts it to the lips of her nursing babe ; the child 

 purses its tiny lips and puffs away with every indica- 

 tion of pleasure. The true Burmese cheroot differs 

 from that of any other country. It is from five to 

 ten inches long, consisting of an envelope of the 

 inner husk of the maize-plant, filled with the finely- 

 chopped leaf and stalk of tobacco, which grows 

 everywhere in Burma. The cheroot is an inch in 

 diameter at the thicker end, and is green, not white, 

 as Tommy Atkins described the one smoked by 

 Supi-yaw-lat, when he ' seed her first ' by the old 

 Moulmein pagoda : 



' Where the flying-fishes play, 

 And the dawn comes up like thunder, 

 Outer China crost the bay.' 



It is indeed a curious and picturesque sight to 

 see a Burmese girl puffing at her big cheroot. The 

 Burmese women smoke with robust and unmis- 

 takable enjoyment, not in the imitative fashion of 

 the advanced women of England. It would be 



4—2 



