in demand and is not bulky in the package.
Send a lot of it. Lime and lemon tablets in the summertime are
great for checking thirst on the march. A few of them won't do any
harm in any parcel, summer or winter.

Now about smoking materials. Unless the man to whom the parcel is
to be sent is definitely known to be prejudiced against cigarettes,
don't send him pipe tobacco or a pipe. There are smokers who hate
cigarettes just as there are some people who think that the little
paper roll is an invention of the devil. If any one has a boy over
there, he--or she--had better overcome any possible personal
feeling against the use of cigarettes and send them in preference
to anything else.

From my own experience I know that cigarettes are the most
important thing that can be sent to a soldier. When I went out
there, I was a pipe smoker. After I had been in the trenches a week
I quit the pipe and threw it away. It is seldom enough that one has
the opportunity to enjoy a full pipe. It is very hard to get
lighted when the matches are wet in bad weather, which is nearly
always. Besides which, say what you will, a pipe does not soothe
the nerves as a fag does.

Now when sending the cigarettes out, don't try to think of the
special brand that Harold or Percival used when he was home. Likely
enough his name has changed, and instead of being Percy or Harold
he is now Pigeye or Sour-belly; and his taste in the weed has
changed too. He won't be so keen on his own particular brand of
Turkish. Just send him the common or garden Virginia sort at five
cents the package. That is the kind that gives most comfort to the
outworn Tommy or Sammy.

Don't think that you can send too many. I have had five hundred
sent to me in a week many times and have none left at the end.
There are always men who do not get any parcels, and they have to
be looked out for. Out there all things are common property, and
the soldier shares his last with his less fortunate comrade.
Subscribe when you get the chance to any and all smoke funds.

Don't listen to the pestilential fuddy-duds who do not approve of
tobacco, particularly the fussy-old-maids. Personally, when I hear
any of these conscientious objectors to My Lady Nicotine air their
opinions, I wish that they could be placed in the trenches for a
while. They would soon change their minds about rum issues and
tobacco, and I'll wager they would be first in the line when the
issues came around.

One thin