St Nicotine of the Peace Pipe

by Edward Vincent Heward

Queen Elizabeth.

Let us take a peep at a reception, an ‘At Home,’ where a dark-eyed daughter of Japan reposes luxuriantly on a carpet of many colours. By her side is an arm-rest, and a gorgeous screen adorned with wondrous figures in prismatic hues protects her from obtrusive view. Two English ladies are her visitors; they are ushered through a long corridor, covered with thick matting of a fine texture, into the reception hall. Passing into a large well-proportioned room, they are agreeably surprised with the simplicity and tasteful character of the furniture, which consists of a row of small lacquer tables and chairs, placed at intervals of a few yards; by the side of each chair is a large bronze urn of ornamental design, filled with symmetrically shaped pieces of glowing charcoal. Raising the eyes to the walls they see that these are covered with a heavy yet delicate paper artistically painted with birds and flowers; and the wainscoting, panels and window-frames, are of a highly polished black lacquer. Over all there seems to hang a drowsy luxurious atmosphere, quite in keeping with the old-world ease and courtly manners of their truly polite hostess. Meanwhile female servants have noiselessly placed before them the tabako-bon, upon which rests a gold-dotted lacquered case, delicately made of leather-paper; it is about eighteen inches long, and twelve broad, and stands the height of three fingers. On the removal of the lid the first things which strike the eye are three chased little tobacco-pipes, each enclosed in a silk lined case, which in form so nearly resembles the calausilia that it is called the kiseru-gai—pipe snail. The bowl of the pipe is a fairy-like thing of the size and shape of an acorn-cup, and is of finely wrought silver; the stem, about six inches long, is of thin lacquered bamboo, and the mouthpiece is of brightly polished metal. The pouch holding the tobacco is also of stamped leather, and is finely decorated with lacquer and silver work. But the tobacco is something wonderful; though an exotic of the genus nicotina-tobacum of America, it has cast off its native characteristics and become a light-coloured delicate weed, which lissome fingers have cut into flossy shreds as fine as gossamer and as soft as cocoon silk. As the usages of polite society in Japan require that the visitors should smoke while chatting, the hostess taking a few shreds of the weed between her fingers and rolling them up into pellets to fit the tiny bowls urges her guests to join in the grateful pastime. One of the ladies, however, declines the proffered pipe, saying, ‘Arigato, tabako-o nomimasen,’ (thank you, I don’t drink tobacco) at which the hostess with wondering eyes asks if she is under a vow! She thinks that ladies everywhere smoke; that to do so is a binding rule of the unwritten law of social intercourse. But on the other guest accepting a pipe, saying, ‘tabako-o nomimas,’ (I drink tobacco) the charming hostess nods and laughs, and with her own delicate fingers tries her best to light the pipe with an English match, and only after repeated attempts can she accomplish the difficult feat. While thus occupied a sprightly, intelligent, little gentleman enters, and is introduced as the husband of the hostess. He is brimful of Western ideas, and readily joins his wife in ceaseless questions concerning England and the English; more particularly he seeks information about the habits, manners and government of the country; for he is most anxious to learn whether what he has just heard in the city is really true, namely: that in England no gentleman is allowed to smoke in the presence of a lady without first obtaining her permission. He cannot credit it, but he explains that the question is greatly perturbing men’s minds in Japan. It is feared that if this Western custom should spread and take root amongst them, men’s authority over women would be gone; certainly their pre-eminence would be seriously imperilled. The visitors try to reassure him. They tell him that as a rule gentlemen do pay this deference to ladies out of considerations of delicacy, as behoves men towards women, as well as from a chivalric regard for ladies generally. But this was a line of argument he seemed unable to follow; he was dominated with the idea that the custom if adopted in Japan would be the thin end of the wedge which ultimately would sever men from their proper control over their wives and women-folk generally. With a countenance expressive of perplexity and dismay he foretold of endless domestic storms issuing from the fuming pipe. It was not without amusement that the English ladies witnessed this curious reflex of a Western spectre which a few idle people have raised for their diversion, and it required some effort to suppress their feelings. They did their best, however, to smother the emotion; but the spectacle presented to their imagination of wives boxing their husbands’ ears for daring to smoke in their presence without leave, and all the varied scenes of the battle of the pipes fought over the domestic hearth, was too much for them. Warming to the subject the bellicose little gentleman exclaimed, ‘The enemy outside our gates we can grapple with and overthrow, but a Western idea, and a fickle one like this, who can seize and vanquish? I have myself but recently suffered through this innovation, but it shall be the last time.’ And he so far forgot his native politeness as to declare that he would smoke when and where he pleased, and if the ladies did not like it they might leave the room. He added, ‘I do so in virtue of my right as a man. The assumed right of the women in Europe to determine whether a man may smoke or not is an unwarrantable licence, and is all put on in order to bring men under their authority in other and more important affairs; in any case, it subtracts from the power of men, and there can surely be no reason in this, as it involves limitations to their authority which must inevitably provoke confusion and conflict. I can find no reason for making distinctions—for smoking before men and not before women when it is not a thing forbidden by law or morals.’ The ladies endeavoured to soothe the ruffled feelings of their irate host; they assured him that nothing is farther from the thoughts of intelligent gentlewomen than the folly of trying to subvert the order of nature; that the deference paid to ladies in such matters by their kinsmen is the outcome of good breeding, and it is always appreciated in that sense. ‘There are a few women, perhaps, who having much time and little to do make it their hobby to cry out for the unattainable, and whom the gods may some day punish by giving them what they crave for; but these women are of no account in the general estimate of the sum of Western domestic life; their voices are loud, but their judgment is weak. On the other hand, there are in Europe ladies of the highest rank who, out of pure love of doing good, devote the best part of their lives and fortunes to the noble purpose of relieving the needs of the destitute, and raising the lowly and suffering into better estate. Little room then for wonder that Englishmen are proud to do them honour.’ Though appeased in some measure, he was not wholly convinced that danger was not somewhere lurking in their alluring argument. Let it be noted, however, that young Japan is outgrowing such apprehensions; he is no longer restive under the restraints imposed upon his primitive habits, and his conception of the relationship of the sexes is in accord with European ideas. Western ideas, indeed, are his ideas; and, he shows how fully he recognises the superiority of European civilization, by equipping himself with all the most destructive engines of warfare.

Like the workmen of the busy cities, the Japanese peasant carries with him wherever he goes his pipe and tobacco-pouch slung to his obi, a bright-coloured girdle, made usually of a peculiar kind of silk interwoven with flowers. They hang behind, suspended from a silken cord fastened to the obi by means of a netzuke—a sort of carved button made of cornelian or agate. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, their peculiar smoking apparatus does not lend itself readily to indulgence while at work or when walking. To enjoy the solace of the weed, the smoker must squat on the ground and array his smoking utensils in order; but this little drawback seldom hinders him. When the desire for the pipe comes upon him it must be appeased; and is it not written in the learned Ensauki that the pipe ‘affords an excuse for resting now and then from work, as if to take breath?’ Certainly, the intelligent Japanese never suffers an opportunity to pass unimproved by rest and reflection over the vapour of his beloved pipe as it ascends on high, mingling with the pure breath of heaven; while possibly the lingering ashes suggest to his contemplative mind the mutability of all things earthly—for who can price for another the thing which his soul valueth?

Passing along the unbeaten tracks of Japan the wayfarer from the West occasionally comes upon picturesque scenes of peasant life of a character which combines primitive simplicity of manners with something of the art and refinement of what we are accustomed to associate with advanced civilization, but which with them springs from a gentle, susceptible nature, always kindly, but quick to resent affront. Turning into a roadside inn he may meet with a party of well-to-do peasants on their homeward way from the market of a neighbouring town, and observe with quiet amazement the public exhibition they make over the bath; they are very fond of bathing, but in their manner of using the tub they have views peculiar to themselves. Fish and rice are in large demand, and of these, with a plentiful supply of vegetables, they make a hearty meal. After dinner tiny cups of tea are served to each guest by dark-eyed damsels whose appearance recalls to memory the nursery pictures of our childhood representing our first parents in the garden of Eden. When the candles are brought in smoking and story-telling follow till bed-time. Then, spreading blankets on the floor, and with a block of wood hollowed to fit the head for a pillow, they are soon on their way to the land of Nod, announcing their arrival in a fine symphony of cracked bassoons.

As everybody smokes in Japan the rate of consumption per head of the population is considerably greater than with us. And shops for the sale of tobacco and all its accessories are to be seen in every street in the big towns, and in every village which has shops at all; even along the country roads there are stands where all these things can be had for the merest trifle. On the sign the tobacconist exhibits to denote his vocation is painted a leaf of the plant, and by the side there are two hieroglyphics which are understood to intimate that he keeps only the best tobacco, procured from the famous kokubu in the Osumi district. The name bears a significance similar to that of Virginia with us. But the taste of the weed grown in this favoured district is not such as commends itself to English smokers; it is too sweet, and on this account is but little exported to Europe. It is used here for mixing with other kinds of a more pungent character: French tobacco would be all the better for the admixture. But to do this in France, where the cultivation, manufacture and sale of tobacco is a Government monopoly, would perhaps interfere with the public revenue.

The Japanese method of raising crops of tobacco, of curing and manufacture, is in all essentials similar to that of other countries where tobacco-culture is a staple industry. The seed-beds of the young plants are protected against too great cooling from radiation on spring nights by straw roofs about a metre high. Towards the end of April, in the warmer districts, the shoots are strong enough to be transplanted into the open fields, where they are placed in rows usually along the sides of crops of barley which by this time has passed its bloom. In cooler districts this operation is delayed until June. But, as tobacco-culture is widely spread throughout the islands, the seasons for planting and reaping necessarily differ according to the varying temperatures of this plutonic region of sulphurous springs and earthquakes. Besides the pleasure of smoking, the Japanese, like ourselves, have found many uses for tobacco. For destroying insects on plants, nothing is so effectual as dosing them with a liberal decoction of the juice. Like all other orientals the Japanese have to wage perpetual warfare with those plagues of the flesh that invade every house. In order to check their ravages, he places leaves of the plant in crevices where they usually hide in ambush against the hour for making their nocturnal attack. Mosquitoes, too, are numerous, hungry, and of good size, but in the magic breath of the weed he has found a potent spell which soon overcomes the enemy and lays him low. All he finds it needful to do, is simply to seat himself on his mat in his toy-like house and enjoy the double pleasure of knowing that he is vanquishing the foe while puffing his wee pipe and twirling up pellets to fit the thimble-like bowl. He has discovered, too, that Saint Nicotine is a dispenser of other inestimable blessings. As a healer of many maladies—cutaneous affections, some forms of eye disease, and other like disturbers of a tranquil life—he believes in her implicitly, and lotions made of the juice extracted from the leaves of the plant are in almost daily use among the poorer classes.

Young Japan having entered with a light heart and buoyant into the stream of European life no longer cares for the old ways of his fathers, and finds his chosen smoke in the new paper cigarette fashioned in the Western world. Of these he partakes so liberally that many millions are imported every year, the total value of which, according to the Consular Report, comes to about £40,000. To such proportions has the tobacco industry grown that in Osaka (the Manchester of Japan) no fewer than forty factories provide remunerative employment for thousands of work-people—chiefly women and girls. In 1895 Japan exported close upon three million pounds weight of tobacco, the estimated value of which was £23,466. Under the influence of an overmastering passion to mould their institutions on the model of those of Europe, the Government have thought well to lay hands upon the tobacco industry; henceforward it is to be a Government monopoly. Referring to the Japanese Budget of 1897-8, Sir Ernest Satow, in the Diplomatic and Consular Report on Trade and Finance for the fiscal year 1897-8, discusses the question. The Bill was passed in the session of 1896, and the monopoly is to come into force at the beginning of 1898. The principle of the scheme is, that tobacco grown in Japan shall be delivered in the leaf to the Government at a fixed rate. The Government will then sell it to the manufacturers at rates which will ensure substantial relief to the depleted exchequer, to the extent, possibly, after all expenses of collection, etc. are met, of about half a million sterling. The annual yield of the tobacco fields of Japan is estimated at 90,000,000 lbs., its market value of £90,000, and the gross revenue therefrom at £1,000,000. Here Sir Ernest Satow’s incisive criticism comes into play. He shows that to realize this sum a tax of over 100 per cent. must be levied, and that this would bring up the price to the consumer to double what it is now. He points out that tobacco leaf can be imported into Japan at 10c. per lb., add to this the import duty, namely 35 per cent., and the result will be that the Government will try to sell its tobacco at 21⅑c. and this, too, in face of the fact that imported tobacco can be sold for 13.5c. per lb. There is a further important consideration telling against the Government scheme, namely: that as the tobacco intended for exportation does not come under the monopoly the producer can send his unmanufactured leaf out of the country, have it prepared for use and brought in again ready for the retail dealer, and still compete successfully with the Government. Sir Ernest adds that, ‘Were the simple system adopted, in operation in England, of warehousing, it is estimated that with the same tax a revenue of at least £1,000,000 could be obtained.’ The monopoly scheme was severely criticised in the Senate, and it was thought that it would be amended, but up to the date of Sir Ernest’s report nothing had been done in this direction.

The marvellous transformation which has taken place in Japan within the last thirty-five years has hardly left a vestige behind of the old order of things which so charmed the eyes of the stranger from the West. Even in the remote villages the peasantry, as if ashamed to be themselves, are entering upon new paths and disguising their primitive habits of social life under the garb of Western modes and manners. The graceful native costume is supplanted by the distortions of dress which the caprice of art sends forth from Paris as if to render humanity ridiculous. It is not a pleasing sight to look upon Japanese ladies enduring torture in their efforts to accommodate themselves to Western fashion and finery. And the men, skewered up in sombre broad-cloth, lose the ease and dignity which by nature’s gift is theirs. Would it not be well, while gathering the fruits of old European culture, for this Eastern people to preserve their native habits, works and ways, all those things which are the natural product of their race and climate? Of course, in commerce, the observance of the eternal verities, as Carlyle would say, forms the basis of all healthy and lasting good.