CHEMIST BLAMES TOBACCO.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 22, 27 January 1916, Page 7

CHEMIST BLAMES TOBACCO.

FOR GERMAN ATROCITIES. STRONG WEED SMOKED. According to Mr. F. H. Moleswort.h, analytical chmist, of Sydney, the orrgin of the 1 Teutonic passion for atrocity, as evidenced in the present war, can be traced to an over-indulgence in tobacco. Speaking at the Granville Brotherhood meeting recently, Mr. Molesworth related his experiences in Germany just xirior to the outbreak of the war. He said that the Germans smoked the strongest and rankest tobacco in the world, and it was part of t-he military doctrine to encourage the use of vile, strong weed with the object of destroying the men's moral fibre. The Teuton, he said, was not degraded by strong drink, but by tobacco, and consequent nicotine poisoning. He attributed the horrible atrocities of the German as*my to over-indulgence in tobacco. It maddened soldiers and

goaded them to all kinds of outrageous acts. While visiting Germany he was in a railway carriage with four men and a woman, who all smoked pipes that were offensively strong. Prom their conversation he gathered that a systematic plan of atrocities was to .be carried out in the event of war. He referred to the use of narcotics by the Australian soldier in the trenches. Though admitting that they Required a sedative, to calm their nerve's, he contended that the practice of smoking was carried too far. So?diers, by -heavy smoking, rendered themselves unfit for service, and men fit and well, who had taken on cigarettes after enlisting, were subsequntly rejected owing to the evil effect of nicotine poisoning.