WHEN LADIES SMOKED PIPES.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 195, 28 July 1916, Page 1 (Supplement)

WHEN LADIES SMOKED PIPES.

IT BEGAN IN THE REIGN OF QUEEN BESS.

Some enterprising person has just written a history of smoking; so now wo shall all be seeing visions of courtiers and stately dames in just the correct period and setting as we puff 'it our pipes in leisure hours. Of course, it all began with Sir Walter Raleigh ; we do not need to be told that. He set the fashion, and even persuaded Queen Bess to try the latest craze, for Sir Walter was rather a dog, and had a way with t>he ladies. As it happened, the Queen did not take to it: slip thought it tasted horrid, and it made her feel sick. But she liked to see her ladies-in-waiting with a pipe between their pretty teeth, so smoking prospered in her reign. Apothecaries were the men to buy tobacco from, and s«me of them took pupils to whom they taught the ''slights," as they termed it, of the p : pe. That is to say, they showed them how to blow smoke through their noses, how to make rings, and otherwise distinguish themselves Every knut carried a sumptuous smoking outfit, sometimes of gold or silver, containing a tobacco box, tongs for lifting live coals, a kidle for snuff, a priming iron, and a good selection of nines. 'SPECIAL NON-SMOKERS FOR WOMEN

However. .Tames T. put his foot down when lie came to the throne, and forbade the use of tobacco, " the black'* stinking fume" of which he( compared to the smoke of the bottomless pit! A'though he put it so crude'y, so that !v must have got people's backs up and made a lot of ill-feeljtig, his word was »nw. There was nothing for lvs poor subjects to do but to knock off tobacco and take to snuff instead. It was only in the nineteenth century that smoking again l>ecame fashionable. Someone brought over a bo\ of cigars to England from Spain and that started things going ;• though for some years it was considered very daring to be seen with a ciglr. Matters moved quickly after that. In 1859 the first wooden p : pe appeared, to be followed by the cigarette in 1860. This last was a boon to women, who naturally had felt a little shy of the pipe and the cigar. At the present day cigarette smoking is extreme'y popular with both sexes all over the civilised world. Indeed, in Russia you will see railway carriages marked' "For lad:e< who do not smoke."