246 SNUFF AND SNUFF-BOXES. 



engraved in Du Sommerard's Arts du Moyen Age.* 

 It has a cover for the larger receptacle, into which the 

 snuff falls in grinding ; which is also ornamented with 

 carving. Du Sommerard had several such implements 

 made in wood, ivory, and bronze, and they are now with 

 his other collections in the Hotel Cluny, Paris. In the 

 work just quoted he has engraved five other speci- 

 mens.f One sculptured in wood bears the title and 

 arms of Gaston d' Orleans, the brother of Louis XIII. 

 Another has upon it a figure of Sganarelle, rasping 

 the tobacco and singing his celebrated couplet "Le 

 tabac est divin," &c. Another represents Lot and his 

 daughters, and the destruction of Sodom. Another the 

 rape of Proserpine ; thus proving that as much variety 

 of subject and decoration was adopted for these imple- 

 ments, as for the more modern snuff-box. + 



It was the custom at this time to half ruin the 

 tobacco by "purifying" it in water. It was for two or 

 three days washed in a clay vessel and strained, then 

 washed again, dried in the sun, and finally coloured to 



* Album, serie iii. pi. 29. 



+ In the plate above referred to, and in serie x. pi. 35. 



X The engraving on p. 123, of a man chewing tobacco, is copied from 

 the top of one of these rasps ; it has been thus described in vol. xxiii. of 

 Archceologia : — It is six inches in length and two in breadth, about 

 half an inch deep, composed of several ornamental woods inlaid with ivory. 

 It contained a perforated grater of blue steel, and a small compartment 

 was left uncovered at the upper end to receive the snuff and admit the 

 fingers. On the sliding lid is an inlaid ivory figure of a man. This lid 

 protected the grater, and converted it into a sort of snuff-box. The custom 

 of chewing tobacco is alluded to in early medical works, as well as in the 

 earliest accounts we have of the Indians. But it met with most disfavour 

 at the hands of physicians, and only achieved its great popularity in the 

 British Navy. 



