Revelations about tobacco : a prize essay on the history of tobacco, and its physical action on the human body, through its various modes of employment / by Hampton Brewer.
- Brewer, Hampton.
- Date:
- 1870
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Revelations about tobacco : a prize essay on the history of tobacco, and its physical action on the human body, through its various modes of employment / by Hampton Brewer. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![Smoking,—I have called the third way in which man satisfies his desire for tobacco. It is a luxury which is far more frequently and universally sought after than either of the two preceeding ; the pipe or cigar being employed not only by our male population, but often our women are taken by surprise enjoying a whiff in some secluded corner. The different modes in which tobacco is smoked are peculiar. I will mention one described to me by an uncle of mine (who lived for seven- teen years in Africa) as employed among one of the tribes of Kaffirs. He says : “ A Kaffir takes his knife from his pocket and with it cuts a round hole, of about an inch and a half diameter, in the turf; he next procures a piece of round straight wood, of two feet long and an eighth of an inch diameter (or thereabouts), with this he bores a hole more or less obliquely under the turf, towards and communicating with the circular Jiole he has before cut, which forms the bowl of his pipe, if so it may be called. This done, he places his tobacco in his rudely and readily constructed pipe, lights it and then goes to the other opening about eighteen inches from the bowl; to this he applies his mouth, lying at the time flat on his face ; here he lies and smokes to his heart’s content, and when his pipe is empty refills it.” This is a method of smoking which I have never before heard or read of. I shall now endeavour to state as clearly as I am able, the opinions which I entertain of the effects of smoking upon the system of man, and explain fully my reasons for entertaining these opinions. As Akenside said “ Different minds Incline to different objects, ours pursue The vast alone, the wonderful, the wild.” The habit of smoking is increasing daily, and boys as well as men are frequently met, with pipes in their mouths; the smoker is the rule, the non-smoker the exception; therefore I think it is high time that they, who know the injury that may be produced by this fasci- nating habit, should rise in a body and endeavour by all the means in their power to repress it. [Note D.] Whenever 1 meet a man with a pipe in his mouth I cannot help asking myself the following questions :—Is smoking injurious or not ? What may be said in favour of it, and what against it ? My answer to the first of these questions, will be plain from the opinions I offer on the second; I shall, therefore, in answering them, reverse their order.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28085784_0023.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
