Pipes 



151 



In old municipal records there frequently occurs the 

 entry 'For burning fowle pipes is.' In inns these 

 renovated pipes were afterwards used in the tap- 

 room, parlour customers being provided with new 

 clays. 



About the middle of the eighteenth century makers 

 ceased to produce the long Dutch-modelled pipes, and 

 returned to the smaller and handier clays, thus show- 

 ing that smoking was decreasing among the leisured 

 classes, who had patronized the graceful, long pipe. 

 The lower classes still smoked, and for their worka- 

 day use the pipe-maker catered by the production of 

 small handy pipes. Though now so cheap and 

 plentiful, pipes were formerly costly. As recently 

 as 1882 clays — true, they were moulded with figures 

 — cost sixpence each. 



The decoration of clay pipes with effigies, figures, 

 busts of animals, and celebrities was formerly very 

 common. To be carved in effigy on a pipe was the 

 hall-mark of notoriety in bygone days, as to be 

 cartooned by Punch or have a collar or necktie 

 called by one's name is now. From a collection 

 of clay pipes it would be possible to write a history 

 of the heroes and events of the last two centuries. 

 The Duke of Wellington, Nelson, Pitt, were thus 

 immortalized ; the introduction of railways, the 

 Crimean War, the Civil War and abolition of slavery 

 in America were all thus commemorated on pipe- 

 bowls. The head and bowl of pipes were frequently 

 quite distinct, the wooden stem being inserted on 

 occasion by the smoker. The danger of breaking 

 clays in the pocket was thus greatly reduced. Carved 



