174 TOBACCO-PIPES, CIGARS, ETC. 



which he performed by applying the edge of a case- 

 knife to his lips : upon laying down the knife, he took 

 up a pair of clean tobacco-pipes, and after having slid 

 the small ends of them over a table in a most melo- 

 dious trill, he fetched a tune out of them, whistling to 

 them at the same time in concert. In short the 

 tobacco-pipes became musical pipes in the hands of 

 our virtuoso, who confessed ingenuously, that he broke 

 such quantities of pipes that he almost broke himself, 

 before he brought this piece of music to any tolerable 



perfection." Balancing to- 

 bacco - pipes was a novel 

 feat introduced for London's 

 amusement: in 1743 a Turk 

 named Mahommed Caratha, 

 performed on the slack-rope 

 at Sadler's Wells, firing pistols 

 from each hand as he stood 

 upon it, and balancing at the 

 same time seven tobacco- 

 pipes on a ring held in his 

 mouth ; as shown in our cut, 

 copied from a rare engraving 

 published at the time. He performed for some years, 

 and was succeeded by an Englishman named Maddox, 

 who flourished from 1753 to 1770, balancing the same 

 number of pipes on his chin, " two pipes crossways on 

 a hoop," holding also in his hands a chain and a 

 coach wheel ! Powel, the fire-eater, in one of his 

 advertisements {circa 1770), notes among his other 



