LIBER'S NOTEBOOK

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 156, 27 March 1920, Page 11

LIBER'S NOTEBOOK

On "Baccy" in Books,

Apropos to a recent .ndviinco ill Hit' price of, tobacco' in Great Britain, "Penguin, 1 '-ot' the London "Observer," saysthat oiii-. authors have in truth dealt handsomely by tobacco. A few, lie admits, Jihvo-denounced it, but:the anthologies 'compiled 'in its praise—Mr. W'. : G.' Hutchison s "Lyra Nicotiana" is one. ot tho best—have been able to include writers as diverse as Raleigh and Mr. J!ud-' yard Kipling,- Byron and' Sir James- Barrle, Lamb and Lowell and Longfellmv. anions its advocated • "Sir' AY«lt«rRaleigh," wrote a schoolboy at an examination, "introduced tobacco into Bug-! land, and when his first pipe, he exclaimed: 'By the grace of God, Muster 'R id ley. we .'have lighted' such a'fire, in England as shall never'more'be put out.'" Critics -would find some confusion.in the, facts, but there is certainly, •an element of what may be .called'the. higher truth-in,.the statement '

"Penguin,'.' .I- notice, .-qnotes Carlyle's; tribute to tobacco: "Sedative, gently clarifying tobacco smoke";' also Culver-' ley's: famous, ode: -

•Sweet when the morn is ijrey, Sweet, when they've cleared away Lunch, nnd at close of day— Possibly BweetCßt. ■

As a. matter of fact ;cven smoking 'In. bed, a-pernicious but"agreeable habit-to. which "Liber" confesses; in his; bachelor 'days, "bien entendu; to •'have been- iiddiblcd, lias found it defenders. '■ 1 ' •

" 'Do you, always smoke arter you goes to bed, old cock?' inquired Mr. .tVcllor of Bis landlord, when they lied both retired for the night. Tes. I does. .young . bantam, 1 replied the-, cobbler:'" ' " • .

Mr.' Pickwick, like'..that other great. Englishman, Dr. Johnson, was not, eo ! . "Penguin" reminds us, .a'smoker, though! both of.them approved,of snicking iii others., . Boswell tells ,us that Johnson had a high opinion of "the' sedative influence of smoking," and when' Johnson was at Aberdeen .on his journey, to tho Highlands, he'lamented to Br. 'Watson' that smoting had "g6ne out.-"' "To be Bure/'/he added, "it is a shocking thing, blowing smoke out"of our mouths, into other people's mouths, .-'and having' -tho same thing done to .lis.' '.Yet I cannot account why a thing whichrequires so little exercise, and yet preserves the, 'mirid from total vacuity, should 'have gone out." . And; when Mr.. Pickwick 1 seized the opportunity of studying .human nature at .the .Magpie and Stump,; close beside New Inn, he-was at first, received by the company, in total .silence

"You don't find thiß ,sort ,of:'thing disagreeable. I hope, ; sir," said his-right-hand neighbour, a Gentleman in a/ch'ecfcod Biiit and Mosaic studs,-.with a. cigar, in. his mouth. . . ~ i

Not in the least," replied Mr. PickwicJr, 'I like it very-much, although I am no smoker inytelf, *•

I should be very sorry to' say I wasn't-,", interposed another .srentleman .on the- op-; posite side'of the table.',' "It's board and lodging to me, is. sinolte." ' Mr. Pickwick glanced at the speaker,.nhd tnoueht that if it wdre' washing, too, it would be all the better.

Mr. Kipling got 'into sore trouble over his . dictum, attacked , as beinjj. cvni-al and selfish—that.' ' . ,

A woman*ls only a woman, 'But-a good cisrur is-^'graok*?.

. The quotation ;is not - to' be : , fbund in : every edition.,-of Kipling, ,;liut "Liber''possesses the poem] from winch it is token. "The Betrothed", is the title, in a delightful little anthology, "Pipe aud Pouch, or The Smoker's Book of Poetry," by the late Joseph. Khiplit—"All: Night Knight" lie was called, from his; heing.generally .tjic ,last. after; a Savage Club'dinner. -r •

•' I'- notice that "Penguin" says he - ' has' been "unable to discover any outstanding defence of the cigarette," but in Knight's anthology . I come, across more than one tribute to the charms of. wluit 60 ina.iy present-day 'worshippers nt lijo shrine..of "My Lady ; .. Nicotine", consider the daintiest and. most: agreeable form, of "drinking"—as the' Elizabethans used! to call smoking—tobacco. There is-'eVcn a tribute to''the cigarette; from Ella •Wheeler Wilcox

• I am rather surprised that "Penguin" does not mention the famoiis'poem • iu Tvhich the Stuartian' poet, . Gcorgo Wither, .describes smoking: as sjmlwlieal of life. I quote the, three concluilinj stanzas:— -. /•" ' '7.:' '■ :

!And.when the .emoke ascends on'.high.; Think thou .liehol'dst the vanity, Of worldly stuffe, gone with a, p'uffc, Thus.think, then drinkfe tobacco;

And when the pipe wows fonl-.wltliln, •Think .on thy soul defil'd- with .sin.-: ■ 'And then the fire; it- doth- require.- • .(Thus- think,- then drinlte tobacco."; . ■ The ashes that are.left bejind '"■' ••May. serve to- nut thee 'still in '' That'unto dust return thou 'munt,'' iThus, think,' and drinke tobacco,| "

"Penguin," however, gossips very pieasip.ntlv ami- learnedly upon "the. connection between tobacco and,literature,.-. H.e.en'laracs. ) notice, on Thackerayjs oft-re-; ■neateil defence of'the weed. -In latterdav limes- Sir' James ' you ■ever read that charming bbqk; "My Lady Nicotine" ?--has been a staunch defender of smokuur, but to "Ljber's", minfl one of the prettiest and neatest tributes 'to tobacco is to be,found in a little set of verses bv'Richanl,'L'e Gallirnne. - They: are entitled "With Pipe and- Book," anil Tun as follow:— ■

■IVitli Pipe and'Booh'at close of day. Oh, what is sweeter. mortal, say? It matters not what book on knee. Old Iznak or. the Odyssey, It matters not meerschaum or. clay. 'And fhoujrh one's eyes will dream astray 'And lips forget to sue or sway,It is "enough to lwreiy he". With Pipe and Book. ... Whet though." our modern . skies be crpj'As bards aver,-1 will not pray . ... For "snothine Death" to succour me. But ask this much. 0 Fate, of theb •A little longer yet to stay ' .' With Pipe and Book.

Bulwer-Lvtton was a-.great- smoker: "A pipe,"; lie cays in "Night and Morning" (a novel, by the way, to which read-, crs of the, present., genetation might do worse, than. turn back when they have n snare evening),' "is a great soother—a rvleasanf. comforter. Blue devils fly. before its honest breath. It ripens (ho brain, it opens'the heart, and the man who smokes .thinks lik<> a-sage, and no'a like a Samaritan:" ' I -am afraid, however. that Lytton's o\Vn 'daily, doso of the divine weed would .I)6'. voted excessive—and dangerous to most. : pedn!e-.by. our friends.-the doctors.. ■ Dr; ■•Garrett,■'the niedirnl inaii who" attended; tho author of "Th.c.Last, 'Days of Pompeii," .in his declining.- years', /gives h. enrious acccunt <ji Lvtlon's extraordinary ..addiction In his net habit. .-

"After breakfast," said .the.doctor.; "the pi no was brought into reouisition. in his sitting-room—a , weapon, ~, or . instriiiflpiil; some six..or sercn feot. in.-lonpth. Ohs«*rv• in?, as T -invariably did. .a. tyrEe v .fln»n , iy r of Latakni *obacco eproad] out ni? mantelpiece. T said one '-.flay:' 'Yot) -{type/H' to mc. Sir Edward, to, Pinoko a. .jrent deal.' to which ho replied/ hi« nMiaV rhecrftil. pood-humoured way:* 'WYU.- indeed,.! do not. I take a few whiff?, an*? tlipn T nut mv nine down.' Not Mm? **- aotlv .satisfied'■ with this denunciation. I took the freedom of iiKjuiring.of his valet how muck tobacco his. master rcnll.v eon'fumed. IT" informed* me-that Sir Td. ward usually smokod from eicht to ton o'unres of tobacco in. a vcek.' .'and.'.. paid' ho. 'T. p.lwnvß nlaco > seven .eiearp. on . the little table 'beside Sir Edward;* bed. and "who»i I so into his room at eiphl o'clock in the morning /for being'rather denf'tho servants' footsteps were not rcndilv lienrfH if. 1 see two dears'-leffcJ '.awake take bis orders; if I find • that . he hn» smoked, them-, all, I let him lio another hour/" . ' ' ' "Eitrhfc to fen ounces a 'week/', plus five cigars a night, would ..kill most lat-ter-dav smokers. ' ' . ''Detective" Fiction and Real Life, Clever "Mr. Barry Pain, complains,; in tho "Daily Mail," that try as ho will he can never come across any of thoso weirdly, mysterious people to whom wu are • intro.ducrd in f Mfteeiivt»" "novel, eo 'popular nowadays. . TTe snvs: "How much crime does the ordinary man encounter* I'm Retting on in life, and

there's never been a murder in any house or hotel where I've been staying. Some yearis ago my wife said that .1 frowsy charwoman whom we then employed stole n bar of soap every time that she came to tho.-houflo; but it's my belief that soap was the last thing that woman would have touchcd. After another interval, of years a gardener of mine pot into troublo for abstracting. 1 the lead from the roof of a dissenting chapc!. And last week'my par-lour-maid -Waß fined because the lamp on her bicycle went out. And that little list represents, crime as I've experienced U Plain men like you and me can go into a restaurant, eat a chop, pay for it. inul eomo outr-and that's the whole of the excitement. But if the magazine brand of detective drops intp a restaurant, the he'.d waiter's a foreign any, and tlie maunirer has escaped from Broadmoor, the cutlet's explosive, -and the salt-collar's full of arsenic; iind at the next table a strangelooking man who's eating a rum omele-te suddenly shoots bis companion, who's a Russian Grand Duke in disguise. Pooplo say that the dotcctivca of fiction are lucky in the way they discover the criminal: but detection's nothing—dogs have been trained to do it. Where those detectives are really lucky is in their constant supply; of; crime, They must have cornered the crime market."

''The Monition of Strikes."' I value'very much a couple of books of literary essays by the late William Saip-uei Lilly, who passed away last year. A posthumous work by Mr. Lilly, entitled "An Invisible Kingdom," has just been published, tho subjects dealt -with being mainly of an ethical nature. ,On certain industrial problems, Mr. Lilly was what I suppose.many people would call a reactionary, but at least he had the courage o£ his opinions. In one very striking chapter entitled "The Monition of Strikes," he condemns in unmeasured terms the Trade Disputes Act of 1906, under which,-the trades unions \»ero granted what ho declares to have been special ami unjust privileges, nnd tho legalising of tjo-called "peaceful picketing," which" is, he says, a contradiction in terms. - Picketing, he holds, should be very sternly suppressed, and he makes very clear what lis means thereby.

"There must, bo. no blandishment, cajolery, or wheedling with a riotous mob. It is foolish—yen, arid worse, it is criminal—to call--out troops and to exhibit them as facets for stone-throwers. I knew of no Jnore contemptible spectacle than the drivelling of tears over izsuigents shot by the military in quelling them. . What are the lives of n few—or a few hundred—rioters in comparison with the vindication of 'aiv find the maintenance of order ?" • Mr. Lilly (say "The Times" reviewer) holds up for admiration and imitation the vigorous measures taken by President Cleveland in the American strike of 1891, and he would have strongly approved of the action of the United States Government in face of the present strikes, -it is curious but significant of the cross-cur-rents in Mr. Lilly's mind to find, it mq,y be in the same page, bitter words against the anarchical individualism of capitalists sanctioned or assumed as necessary by the ol.d orthodox political economists, and equally- vehement condemnation of militant and tyrannical socialism, sure also to terminate in anarchy.