The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-08-29
THE roBAcCo HABIT.


 We chsnce to know q man who was mean enough to make a present to an elderly darky of box of safety matches, leaving the old man in utter ignorance of the matches secret, that had to De struck on the box; and then taking a position at a distance the criminal watched the vexed suf- ferer try to light his pipe. The would be smoker scratched away until the whole box was exhausted and turned heiplessely only to detect the william of the joke consumed with laughter. What is this Mir. Edward Atkinson Us urging upon listening mankind about the proper age at which a man should begin [ toJ bmokey Would he play upon us and laugh at us? He de- fclares ffty-five is the youngest age at which man can with any profit or seemliness put a cigar between his teeth. The intervening years are to be devoted to philosophical research, to a wide and keen observation of life in preparation for the first thrilling. ACdI l-utidtiHS Whth Ut cC SCOfC anu five. This is monstrous. This Yankee may be good at insurance figures; he may know all that there Is to be known of Aladdin stoves, and ovens; he may calculate with nicety the grow ing expense of the Philippines to the people of the United States. and he may inform us anew that 1t is impos- sible for a nation to enrich itself through the methodic plunder of the tariff system. but manifestfy he Is a as you efoose--of smoking.
 Mir. Atkinson made his first essay at smoking when boy, using we be- lieve either dried corn tassels or the more fragrant simulacrum, rabbit to- bacco. He fncautfously seated himself with pipe in mouth near his father, who was at that very moment indulg- ing his fondness for a cigar. The fa- ther had a stick in his hand. The skill with which the stick was used to knock the pipe over the front fence made such a deep impression on the Ooy bhat ~ toOA Aihi ihoHS thoh my years to get over it. At the end of that time he received a new revelation at a London dinner and now comes forward gravely. to announce he has the secret of correct usage in smoking; be sure not to begin until you are sixty-five years of age. This. we re- peat is monstrous. It savers of giving an uhlearned man a box of safety matches with which to vex his temper and waste his time.
 Mir. Atkinson began wrong and has missed an infinite deal of the deeper experiences of childhood. He was never taken out behind the buggy house. by his older brother to be cov- ertiy encouraged to try that brothers pipe and then watched with devil-iike malignity by that brother as the nico- tine- e-charged smoke begets a paleness, the paleness a whiteness, the white ness sickness that would make death welcome, but death lingering leaves the conscious culprit the prey of an unutterable misery. The second at- tempt Is but little less terrible in it's consequencesI and is made none the less heavy Py the lying pretenses of that elder brother, that it never made him sick Nevertheless the experience is treasured through life.
 Now, MT. Atkinson at sixty five claims that he caught step instantly and Is at home in the procession of smokers with the oldest veterans in the ranks. Granted, but taking the normal boy with a leaning to tobacco, further on with his experiences, until he has became a youth, a young man and has his book. his friend. fireside or may be even that finer friend of gentler mould--is the deeply accentuat- ing pleasures of the pipe to be fore gone, neglected on the prim counsel of this belated elder? Whether to smoke or not may be a debatable ques- tion, one as to which we have an opin- ion that 1t is not deemed advisable here to express. but on the question of when to begin to smoke if you are bent on smoking, we have an opinion fixed and unalterable and one cheer fully to be shared with the world, if VIC could natter ourselves for one mo- ment that the world cared to know 1t.