Now, admitting that there are gentlemen who smoke and chew on the streets, how are ladies, or the people, to know that they are such, since the loafer, the blackguard, the thief, the pickpocket, the profaners of God’s name (all), the blackleg, the murderers bear the same insignia of their profession? At one time, every man incarcerated in the Connecticut state prison was a tobacco-user; nearly all, also, at the Maine, Vermont, and Massachusetts prisons.
It is quite lamentable to see how liable tobacco-using is to convert a thorough gentleman into a selfish, dirty blackguard, who will promenade the streets, chatting with some boon companion, while the pair go recklessly along, blowing their offensive smoke directly into ladies’ faces, their ashes into their beautiful eyes, and spitting their filthy saliva directly or indirectly over costly dresses, thinking only of self!
The Man who chews.
Behold the picture of the man who chews!
A human squirt-gun on the world let loose.
A foe to neatness, see him in the streets,
His surcharged mouth endangering all he meets.
The dark saliva, drizzling from his chin,
Betrays the nature of the flood within.
Where, then, O where, shall Neatness hope to hide
From this o’erwhelming of the blackened tide?
Shall she seek shelter in the house of prayer?
A hundred squirting mouths await her there.
The same foul scene she’s witnessed oft before,—
A solemn cud is laid at every door!
The vile spittoon finds place in many a pew,
As if one part of worship were to chew!
THE CHEWER.
Another Street Nuisance.
Speaking of President Grant and his cigar, a writer says,—
“Not only do smoky editors take advantage of this weakness of our president, but tobacconists, greedy of gain, are subjecting it to their sordid purposes. Hitherto these gentlemen have insulted the public taste by posting at their shop doors some savage, some filthy squaw, or some unearthly image, to invite attention to their cigars and ‘negro head tobacco.’ And all this seemed appropriate. But cupidity is audacious, and they now insult American pride by installing at their doors a full, life-like, wooden bust of General Grant offering to passing travellers a cigar. Emblems of majesty are not rare. We have Jupiter with his thunderbolt, Hercules with his club, Ahasuerus with his sceptre, Washington with his Declaration of Independence, Lincoln with his Proclamation of Liberty to four millions, and now, in this year of our Lord, we have President Grant and his cigar!