52 TOBACCO IN EUROPE. 



standing in a stand at Sir Ro. Poyntz parke at Acton 

 tooke a pipe of tobacco, which made the ladies quitte 

 it till he had donne ; " this was after the accident 

 recorded as happening to him when " he took a private 

 pipe," and occasioned his servant to cast the ale over 

 him as the smoke induced him to fear his master 

 was on fire. If there be little credit attached to his 

 memory for thus " disgusting the ladies," there is still 

 less for having indulged in a pipe as he sat to see his 

 friend Essex perish on the scaffold.* 



It is curious to note this well-known anecdote of 

 Raleigh, reported of other persons (a fact not hitherto 

 noted by historians of the herb). The famous jester 

 Dick Tarlton who died in 1588, is one of them, and in 

 his Jests (1611) the tale is thus told ; "How Tarlton 

 took tobacco at the first coming up of it : — Tarlton as 

 other gentlemen used, at the first coming up of 

 tobacco, did take it more for fashions sake than other- 

 wise, and being in a roome, sat betweene two men 

 overcome with wine, and they never seeing the like, 

 wondered at it, and seeing the vapour come out of 

 Tarlton's nose, cryed out fire, fire ! and threw a cup of 

 wine in Tarlton's face. ' Make no more stirre,' quoth 

 Tarlton, ' the fire is quenched : if the sheriffs come, it 

 will turne a fine as the custom is.' And drinking that 

 againe, ' fie,' saj^s the other, ' what a stinke it makes, I 



* He -was ' ' faithful to the end " in his love of tobacco, for Aubrey- 

 relates, that he smoked a short time before his own execution, and thus 

 defends the action : — " He tooke a pipe of tobacco a little before he went 

 to the scaffolde, which some female persons were scandalised at ; but I 

 think 'twas well and properly donne to settle his spirits." 



