ANECDOTES.
The Precious Pipe.—Napoleon greatly patronized the habit of smoking in the French army, so that it soon became actually indispensable for the continuance of that gaité du cœur, for which his troops were remarkable, even in the moments of severest peril. Under the cheering influence of the pipe, they surmounted all difficulties; and, under its consoling power, bore fatigue, and hunger, and thirst with a fortitude and philosophy, remarkable in the annals of military record. During the latter end of their march to Moscow, and after the burning of the Russian capital, they endured severe privations from the loss of their favourite herb, the stock of which was all expended: nor was this all; they suffered exceedingly through want of food and the inclemency of the weather, with many other evils, the smoking of tobacco had hitherto consoled them for. Such was the general state of the army, when a private of the Garde Imperiale, being out with a detachment on a foraging party, chanced to stray from the rest, and, in the skirt of a wood, came upon a little low deserted hut. Overjoyed in the hopes that he might find something to relieve his necessities, he stove in the door with the butt end of his musquet, and instantly commenced a scrutiny, to see if anything had been left behind by those who had evidently lately quitted it. The few articles of comfort it had formerly contained seemed, however, all to have been carried away in the flight of its late inmates, and he was about abandoning his search, when he perceived something stuffed up between the rafters of the ceiling. Thrusting it with his bayonet, a dark bundle fell at his feet: his joy may be better imagined than expressed, when, on untying the rag that bound it, he found a quantity of coarse tobacco. After filling his pouch with it, and stowing the rest of the (to him) invaluable treasure about his person, he pulled forth a short clay pipe, whose late empty bowl he had so often contemplated with melancholy regret, and, having struck a light, filled it with his darling herb, and commenced smoking immediately. “Never,” said the soldier, who himself narrated the tale to us in Paris, “since the campaign began, when we started with the certainty, almost, of returning with plunder to enrich the rest of our lives, did I feel half the pleasurable emotions I did, the hour I spent, sitting in the darkened room of that hut, whiffing the grateful fumes from my short pipe. Indulging in visions that for a long time had been a stranger to me, the much-boasted pleasures of the opium eaters, were nothing in comparison to mine.—I seemed in heaven, sir.”
After having regained the camp, it soon became a subject of remark and discussion, how Faucin (the soldier’s name) got his tobacco to smoke, and looked so cheerful, when his comrades would have given all they were worth for the same luxury. Knowing his extreme danger if it should be discovered he had any quantity of tobacco in his possession, he took every opportunity, when questioned, as he often was closely on the subject, to state that it was only a trifling remnant he had preserved. Under this pretence, he refused the numerous applications that were made him for portions, however small. At length, as his short pipe was still perceived week after week, emitting its savoury steam, on their toilsome march homewards, it was generally suspected, and he was openly told, he had plenty of tobacco in his knapsack, and he was threatened, in case of his refusal to divide a share. Firmly believing he should be robbed, if not murdered, by some of his comrades, who watched him with selfish eyes for the sake of the tobacco he carried, he was obliged by prudence to confess the secret to two corporals and a serjeant, and divide a quantity among them. While their line of march was daily and nightly strewed with the dead and dying, and many a gallant fellow breathed his last on the cold beds of snow, they were wonderfully sustained by the tobacco, that kept up their spirits throughout the scene of famine and desolation, and he reached France with the few wretched remnants of the fine troops, who had quitted it with the eagle’s flight, amid the shouts of vive Napoleon.
An old Quiddist.—A late messenger in a certain public law-office had rendered himself remarkable for the very excellent economy he pursued in the consumption of tobacco. In term time he had always plenty to do, and picked up a sufficient sum to supply the deficiency of business in the short vacations, which enabled him to obtain as much shag as he could well chew at those times, but he never lost sight of the ‘rainy day.’ He frequently got drunk but never forgot the miseries of the ‘LONG VACATION,’ and accordingly acted upon the following plan, which, for its genius, has never been equalled in the annals of chawing:—He would begin, for instance, the first day of Michaelmas term, which succeeds the long vacation, with a NEW QUID, which he would keep only about half the usual time in his mouth, and extract only a portion of its nectarine sweets. This quid, instead of casting it at his feet, he would then transfer to a certain snug little shelf in the office, with the most reverential caution, and obtain another. This practice he would repeat five or six times in the course of the same day, and every day during the times before mentioned, and what was the result? When the long vacation commenced, and he had nothing to do, he had collected the amazing quantity of between 14 and 1500 quids!!! These he worked upon, de novo, during the long recess, and ‘rich and rare’ indeed was the collection; it was the poor messenger’s only comfort.
Dr. Aldrich.—His excessive love for smoking was well known to his associates; but a young student of his college, finding some difficulty to bring a fellow collegian to the belief of it, laid him a wager that the Dean Aldrich was smoking at that time (about ten o’clock in the morning). Away went the latter to the deanery; when, being admitted to the dean in his study, he related the occasion of his visit. The dean, instead of being disconcerted, replied in perfect good humour, “You see, sir, your friend has lost his wager, for I am not now smoking, but only filling my pipe!”
Chinese Arrogance.—As a precursor to the following, it will only be proper to relate, that in China the use of smoking and snuff-taking is general, although buildings are not thought requisite for curing tobacco, as in the West Indies, there being little apprehension of rain to injure the leaves when plucked. Thus the Chinese grow tobacco enough for their own consumption, and will not allow any to be imported, so as to discourage their own cultivation. This prohibition, which has long existed in that country, was some years ago notified to Mr. Wilkodes, the American consul, then at Canton, in the following manner:
“May he be promoted to great powers! We acquaint you that the foreign opium, the dirt which is used for smoking, is prohibited by command. It is not permitted that it shall come to Canton. We beg you, good brother, to inform the honoured president of your country of the circumstance, and to make it known, that the dirt used for smoking is an article prohibited in the celestial empire.”—Paunkbyquia Mowqua, &c. Kai Hing, 22nd year, 5th Month, 22nd day, Canton, May 22nd, 1818.
Sir Isaac Newton.—This illustrious individual was remarkable for smoking and temporary fits of mental abstraction from all around him; frequently being seized with them in the midst of company. Upon one occasion, it is related of him, that a young lady presenting her hand for something across the table, he seized her finger, and, quite unconsciously, commenced applying it as a tobacco-stopper, until awoke to a sense of his enormity by the screams of the fair one.
Extraordinary Match.—Some years ago, in a public room at Langdon Hills, in Essex, the conversation chancing to turn on smoking, a farmer of the name of Williams boasting of the great quantity of tobacco he could consume at a sitting, challenged the room to produce his equal. Mr. Bowtell, the proprietor of the great boot-shop, Skinner-street, and remarkable for smoking “pipes beyond computation,” travelling his round at that time, chanced to be present, and immediately agreed to enter the lists with him for five pounds a-side. A canister of the strongest shag tobacco was placed by the side of each at eight o’clock in the evening, when they began the match. Smoking very fast, by the time the clock had struck twelve, they had each finished sixteen pipes, when the farmer, through the dense atmosphere, was observed to turn pale. He still continued, however, dauntlessly on, but, at the end of the eighteenth pipe, fell stupefied off his chair, when the victory was adjudged to his opponent, who, calling for an extra glass of grog, actually finished his twentieth pipe before he retired for the night!