Evening star., 1905-08-26
CHECK YOUR CIGARS

Now that the theatrical season is draw
ing nigh." somewhat satirically remarked a
married woman Of experience to a party OF
her cronies the other day, "Tve got a
scheme. I've been thinking out the details
for some time It's a scheme that have
been working on with the hope that I:i be
able to induce my husband to take me to
the theater oftener than he does.
You see. it's like pulling teeth to get hin,
out OF the house at all at night during fhe
cold weather. and have to do all sorts of
planning and contriving before / can get
him to take me to the theater. 1t lsrrt
that he doesn't like the theater. But he OBJ
jects to being deprived of his smoking for
so long time as 1t takes to visit theater.
I'm not going to any old kind OF a
theater that'll keep me cooped up for three
or four hours without the chance to insert
a smoke into my SYSTEM is his way OF ex-
pressing 1t. Not much. They ought to
permit smoking In all theaters. anyhow
most women like the smell of tobacco, and
the women who don't like the smoke smell
are not worth considering. any way But
as long as they make fellow cut out
smoking at the theater, why. that let's me
out-they don't get my dough, that's all.
except when I'm fairly bamboozled or bull
led into going. and you won't be able to do
that SO often, either, as the years creep on.
You can go to the theater yourself all you
want to. I'll stake you to matinee tickets
every time you ask for them, and make no
kick about it. But like to eat on my old
pipe a whole heap more than l like the
atrcals. and so I'm afraid you're in trouble
as to the theater-going business, my dear.
so far as getting me to the theater Is con-
cerned'
He said all of this, as usual, one evening
last winter when l tried to get him to en-
thuse over the prospect of taking me to tho
theater, and l said to him:
Why can't you go out between the
acts at the theater and take a smoke, ike
other men. instead Of letting little thing
like that keep you-and me-away from the
theater?'
Because he replied. pretty quickly.
I'm not hop fiend. or anything like one.
just yet. The fellows that go out between
the acts smoke cigarettes. and if you ever
catch me in the act of pulling the paper
fumes into my countenance l give you leave
to sic the paresis expert on me the very
next morning
".Well then.' I went on, why couldn't
you go out between the acts and smoke
cigars?
what! he exclaimed. Light a good
cigar, and take about six whiffs at 1t, and
then have to toss it? That would be nice.
What dye think am. millionaire? Any
how, that would be a mean and onnery way
of treating a cigar. besides being mad
dening thing for any normal man to have
to do
But said, persistently, and thought
I had clincher this time, why couldn't
you get some of these all-tobacco cigarettes
when you go to the theater and smoke
them between the actS?'
1.-The look. whitening as a hot prairie
blast in mid-July. that he bestowed upon
me then convinced me that l hadn't won,
even with that crafty suggestion
My DEAR he said sardonically, can't
ask you If you ever smoked one OF EN-, or
course. but If you ever get chance ask
we'll. ask some of your brothers If they
ever smoked any of those aIl-tobacco Gig
arettes. They'll tell you
so after that converse ton got to think
ing the matter over. and now my scheme is
this:
"The theaters ought to provide snipe-
checking Office for the men who want to
smoke cigars between the acts. 1t could
be located out in the lobby, with proper
fumigating and other sanitary safeguards.
A man could be employed by the theater
management to run the Snipe-checking
plant for a comparatively small weekly SAL
airy. seeing that he would only be required
to work of nights.
MY husband, for example, could go out
after the first act. light his cigar. smoke
on the cigar as long as he had the time to
puff at it. and then pass it to the man or
boy in charge Of the snipe-checking room.
The person in charge would deposit the
still-burning snipe or butt of the cigar on
little tray placed in a numbered compart-
ment and give my husband a small brass
check bearing a number corresponding to
snipe, or butt, had been deposited. Then
at the end Of the second act my husband
could rush breathlessly out of the theater,
hand over his check, seize his snipe, or
butt. and light 1t up again and pull at
1T with all his might until he heard the
warning bell In the corridor announcing
the curtain, when he could deposit it in the
snipe rack again. and so on until the cigar
was wholly consumed.
There would probably be fully a quar-
ter OF an inch of it left after the fall OF
the curtain on the last act. and he could
redeem this and smoke it on the way home
on the back platform of the car and thus
keep himself from perishing from off the
face of the earth for need of a smoke un-
til he got home and Topped into his Morris
chair and got his teeth around the stem of
his old, smelly pipe.
I'm going to write this suggestion out
and send 1t to the theater managers the
first chance l get. l abominate matinees
and the only way that can see of ever get
ting my husband to go to the theater with
me at night is the adoption of the snipe-
checking system or something like it,