Again: the amount of tobacco annually consumed in France, as appears from authentic documents, is about seven millions of pounds; which is about one pound to every four persons. The amount annually consumed in England, as appears from authentic documents, is about seventeen millions; which is about one pound to every man,
woman and child, in that nation.[C] In the United States, probably there are eight times as much used as in France, and three times as much as in England, in proportion to our population. If so, the quantity used in this country cannot fall short of thirty-five millions of pounds;[D] which, at thirty cents a pound, amounts to ten and a half millions of dollars; not including cigars and snuff, which cost half as much more; making the total sum fifteen and three fourths millions of dollars. And this enormous sum is doubtless below what the article actually cost the consumers.
From these three results, we believe there cannot be a doubt that the actual expense of tobacco, in its various forms, to the consumers in this country, may safely be set down at ten millions of dollars a year.
The amount of time lost by the consumers of tobacco, is another item of no inconsiderable moment. Some spend two, three, and four hours a day in this vile indulgence. To all who use the article, in any way, it occasions the loss of more or less time. If we put down the average amount at half an hour a day; and reckon the time thus lost at four cents an hour, it will amount—not reckoning Sabbaths—to six dollars, twenty-six cents a year, for each individual; which, for the whole company of consumers, is an amount of $12,520,000.
The pauperism which tobacco occasions, is another fearful item. Multitudes who are scarcely able to procure the necessaries of life, will shift, by sacrificing health and comfort, to procure the daily quantum sufficit of tobacco. Many very poor families use tobacco, in all ways. Now suppose a poor family use twenty-five cents' worth of tobacco a week; it will amount to twelve dollars fifty cents a year,—and in fifty years, reckoning principal and interest, it will amount to three thousand five hundred and fifty-two dollars.
Just look at this tax for snuff and tobacco, in a single aspect more. Many think it will make no man the poorer, to pay six cents a day for this indulgence. It will make every man the poorer. Let any young mechanic, or farmer, or merchant, consume six and a quarter cents' worth of this drug a day—beginning at twenty years of age, and continuing until he is sixty years old—and the sum total, reckoning principal and interest, will amount, in these forty years, to three thousand five hundred and twenty-nine dollars, thirty-six cents.
If the cost of tobacco,—the neglect of business which it occasions,—the expense of the pipes and the boxes, and the various apparatus which the use of it involves,—and the intoxication to which it leads,—all be reckoned up, the amount of pauperism which this weed brings upon the nation, cannot be less than one quarter of the sum total of all our pauperism. And the sum total of the pauperism in
this nation, has been shown, again and again, to be not less than twelve millions of dollars, annually. Hence the pauper tax, occasioned by the use of tobacco, may be set down at three millions of dollars, annually.
| Here we have, then, the expense of tobacco, | $10,000,000 |
| The time lost by the use of it, | $12,520,000 |
| The pauper tax which it occasions, | $3,000,000 |
| Total | $25,520,000 |
To this sum should be added one-tenth of the waste of property, which strong drink occasions; inasmuch as one-tenth of the rum-drinking must be charged to tobacco. Now, it has been estimated that the whole cost of strong drink used annually, in this country, amounts to one hundred and twenty-five millions of dollars; a tenth of which is twelve and a half millions of dollars. If this tithe be added to the above estimate, it will make the sum total thirty-eight and a half millions. But as I intend my estimates shall be moderate, I will say nothing of the waste of property which tobacco occasions in connection with strong drink. I will put down the sum total as above twenty-five millions of dollars.