The pleasure derived from tobacco is very hard to define, since it is negative rather than positive, and to be estimated more by what it prevents than by what it produces. It relieves the little vexations and cares of life, soothes the harassed mind, and promotes quiet reflection. This it does most of all when used sparingly and after labor. But if incessantly consumed, it keeps up a constant, but mild cerebral exhilaration. The mind acts more promptly and more continuously under its use. We think any tobacco-consumer will bear us out in this definition of its varying effects.
After a full meal, if it does not help, it at least hides digestion. "It settles one's dinner," as the saying is, and gives that feeling of quiet, luxurious bien-aise which would probably exist naturally in a state of primeval health. It promotes, with most persons, the peristaltic movements of the alimentary passages by its relaxing properties.
Smoking is eminently social, and favors domestic habits. And in this way, we contend, it prevents drinking, rather than leads to it. Many still associate the cigar with the bar-room. This notion should have become obsolete ere this, for it has an extremely limited foundation in fact. Bachelors and would-be-manly boys are not the only consumers of tobacco, though they are the best patrons of the bar. The poor man's pipe retains him by his own fireside, as well as softens his domestic asperities.
Excess in tobacco, like excess in any other material good meant for moderate use, is followed by evil effects, more or less quickly, according to the constitution and temperament of the abuser. The lymphatic and obese can smoke more than the sanguine and nervous, with impunity. How much constitutes excess varies with each individual. Manufacturers of tobacco do not appear to suffer. Christison states, as the result of the researches of MM. Parent-Duchatelet and D'Arcet among four thousand workmen in the tobacco-manufactories of France, that they found no evidence of its being unwholesome. Moderate tobacco-users attain longevity equal to that of any other class in the community.
We will cite only the following brief statistics from an old physician of a neighboring town. In looking over the list of the oldest men, dead or alive, within his circle of acquaintance, he finds a total of 67 men, from 73 to 93 years of age. Their average age is 78 and a fraction. Of these 67, 54 were smokers or chewers; 9 only, non-consumers of tobacco; and 4 were doubtful, or not ascertained. About nine-elevenths smoked or chewed. The compiler quaintly adds, "How much longer these men might have lived without tobacco, it is impossible to determine."
The tobacco-leaf is consumed by man usually in three ways: by smoking, snuffing, or chewing. The first is the most common; the last is the most disagreeable.
Tobacco is smoked in the East Indies, China, and Siam; in Turkey and Persia; over Europe generally; and in North and South America. Cigars are preferred in the East and West Indies, Spain, England, and America. China, Turkey, Persia, and Germany worship the pipe. In Europe the pipe is patronized on account of its cheapness. Turks and Persians use the mildest forms of pipe-smoking, choosing pipes with long, flexible stems, and having the smoke cooled and purified by passing through water. The Germans prefer the porous meerschaum,—the Canadians, the common clay. Women smoke habitually in China, the East and West Indies, and to a less extent in South America, Spain, and France.
We have no fears that any reasoning of ours would induce the other sex to use tobacco. The ladies set too just a value on the precious commodity of their charms for that. There is little danger that they would do anything which might render them disagreeable. The practice of snuff-taking is about the only form they patronize, and that to a slight extent.
France is the home of snuff. A large proportion of all the tobacco consumed there is used in this form. The practice prevails to a large extent also in Iceland and Scotland. The Icelander uses a small horn, like a powder-horn, to hold his snuff. Inserting the smaller end into the nostril, he elevates the other, and thus conveys the pungent powder directly to the part. The more delicate Highlander carries the snuff to his nose on a little shovel. This can be surpassed only by the habit of "dipping," peculiar to some women of the United States, and whose details will not bear description.
Chewing prevails par excellence in our own country, and among the sailors of most nations,—to some extent also in Switzerland, Iceland, and among the Northern races. It is the safest and most convenient form at sea.