Social Progress of Tobacco 83 



frequent use of smoking is inconsistent with Friends' 

 holy profession, it is desired that such as have occa- 

 sion to make use thereof take it privately, neither too 

 publickly in their own houses, nor by the highways, 

 streets, nor in alehouses or elsewhere tending to the 

 abetting of the common excess.' 



City fathers in council assembled sought the assist- 

 ance of tobacco in their deliberations. Tobacco and 

 pipes were an indispensable part of the Lord Mayor's 

 banquet. Municipal councils were the originals of 

 Frederick the Great's 'Tabaks Collegium.' For 

 every meeting of the City Council of Bristol in the 

 eighteenth century there were payments out of the 

 municipal funds for 'pipes and tobacco.' At the 

 celebration of the coronation of George I. the council 

 consumed 2 J pounds of tobacco and used 216 pipes. 

 For the entertainment of a judge on circuit in 1702 

 the city provided 2 pounds of tobacco and 2 gross 

 of pipes. The municipal records of other towns are 

 similar. It is evident that smoking was practised on 

 every occasion and in every circumstance of life — and 

 death. Inordinate amounts of tobacco were con- 

 sumed, probably for sanitary reasons, at funerals, 

 which then took place at midnight. 



During the reign of Queen Anne smoking reached 

 its zenith. Practically all England inspired the 

 fragrant fume. It is amusing to observe the despair 

 of resignation with which anti-tobacconists regarded 

 the futility of their efforts to persuade the nation 

 of the enormity of the crime it was committing 

 against morality, health and learning by inspiring 

 the smoke of tobacco. The invective, the vitupera- 



6—2 



