Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1885-10-29

| people are beginning to suspect thaC many
ofthese interesting little personal anecdotes
are bits of pleasant fiction and that history
is not always just. Everybody remembers
who, finding his master smoking, supposed
him to be on fire, and endeavored to eXtin-
guish him with cold water. Regardless of
how much of these stories may be true or
false, We do know that tobacco was intro
duced into England by somebody in the lat
ter part of the sixteenth century, and that
its use soon became as general there as on
the continent.
1t would be difficult to find anywhere a
more pertinent illustration of the powerless-
ness of legislation against popular taste
than in the early history of the extension OF
the use of tobacco. Everywhere in Europe
and in the young American colonies, when
their time came, the most severe laws were
passed to check its progress. Venice was
the first to place a tax upon tobacco, lmpos-
ing it as early as 1868. James /. forbade
cultivation, and ordered growing plants to
! be uprooted. The Gar of Russia announced
that every one in his dOminions, whether
subjects or not, who smoked tobacco, was
to be punished with death, unless the cul-
prt could prove extenuating circumstances,
in which case the sentence might be reduced
to amputatiOn of the nose. The Shah OF
Persia proclaimed to his army that if any
soldier should be seized in the act of smo-
king, he and his pipe and tobacco should
all be burned together. Amuret w., Sui
tan of Turkey, issued mandate that every
person convicted of smoking should be
marched, mounted backward, on an ass
through the streets of the capital with the
instrument of his crime
STUCK THROUGH HIS NOsTRILS.
In Italy, Popes Urban VIII. and Inno-
cent XII. made it the subject of vehement
communication.
| Even in Switzerland special tribunal
was created for the express purpose of bring.
ing to punishment delinquents who used
the forbidden weed.
Yet in spite of all this the use of tobacco
steadily increased. 1t made its way surely
and irresistibly among the people, till to-
day it is established in popular favor in ev-
cry quarter of the globe. In this country,
and in Europe, it is stating it very safely
within bounds to say that three out of every
| four adults are smokers. A rough estimate
of the average annual consumption of to-
bacco for the whole human race few years
or seventy ounces per head each year. In
this country alone in the year 1884, it is
known that there were consumed nearly
three and half thousand million cigars,
over thousand million cigarettes, and
hundred and seventy million pounds of to-
bacco, and the average yearly consumption
in the United States has been computed at
twenty-four pounds for every family in the
country. Within a few years Great Brit
aims consumption was reckoned at fifty
million pounds yearly.
The difficulty in dealing with these enor-
nous figures is that they are so large that
people do not really comprehend them, and
they are so weak by reason of their very
magnitude 1t is perhaps more forcible
state to say that the number Of cigars and
cigarettes smoked in this country alone each
year would, if placed end to end, would. give
US rope of tobacco that would reach far
beyond the moon. With this for a stand
ard it is easy to see what superlativ long
line the annual smoking material of the
world would make if treated in the same
manner. At any rate enough has been
said to give very just idea of the magni
tude of our subject, and thus impressed we
may proceed to examine it more in detail.