leverrier’s planet, and tobacco. 343 
lator, and a great astronomer, of one iota of his reputation, but 
M. Leverrier will, however, permit me to tell him that the analo- 
gists had traversed his planet in all directions more than a gene- 
ration before him, and that they had even permitted themselves to 
name it, and to cite several of its productions. 
Yes, for forty years and more, the analogists have known the 
typical aroma of Leverrier’s planet, and if I do not ask this illus- 
trious savant where tobacco comes from, it is because I fear to 
embarrass him by this insidious question ; it is because I fear lest 
the illustrious savant should answer me like oth^r people, that to- 
bacco comes from America. 
Now, tobacco does not originate in America; tobacco, that 
brutifying narcotic that poisons populations and holds them asleep 
under the political yoke ; tobacco, which has ruined Spain, Tur- 
key, and France; tobacco is one of the pivotal creations of the 
planet Leverrier. The planet Leverrier perfumes with . . . Copo- 
ral, and he who has invented it, perhaps does not know this . . . 
nares liahet sed non. , . . For the rest I defy all the learned men 
in the civilized world to explain to me the symbol of the mon- 
strous subversion written in the scandalous properties of tobacco, 
a plant which makes you breathe through your mouth, and eat 
with your nose ! (See note at the end of this book.) 
I am no astronomer, but I know that the moon-bearing Her- 
schel is cardinal of Love ; and we need know no more to give to 
the academy of sciences the explanation of an enigma in celestial 
mechanics which puzzles it, especially at this time. I mean the 
reversed course of the satellites of Hejschel, directed from east to 
west, while all the other satellites pass from west to east. If 
these gentlemen of the Bureau of Longitudes, busied themselves 
a little more with the laws of passional attraction, and a little less 
with those of gravitative attraction, they would have understood 
long ago, like myself, that the course of the satellites of Herschel 
presents no anomaly, on the contrary . . . seeing that the God of 
love, who rules supremely in this star, naturally rules its material 
movement, and that the God of love has no greater pleasure than 
to upset all received customs, subjecting the strong to the iveaJc 
merely to show His power, and manceuvering his spindles by the 
