those who
have ridiculed that production might find it not easy to controvert some
of its views. King James, in his Counterblast, does not omit the
opportunity of expressing his hatred toward Sir Walter Raleigh, in terms
worthy of that despicable monarch. He continued his opposition to
tobacco as long as he lived, and in his ordinary conversation oftentimes
argued and inveighed against it.

The Virginia tobacco in early times was imported into England in the
leaf, in bundles, as at present; the Spanish or West Indian tobacco in
balls. Molasses or other liquid preparation was used in preparing those
balls. Tobacco was then, as now, adulterated in various ways. The nice
retailer kept it in what were called lily-pots, that is, white jars. The
tobacco was cut on a maple block; juniper-wood, which retains fire well,
was used for lighting pipes, and among the rich silver tongs were
employed for taking up a coal of it. Tobacco was sometimes called the
American Silver Weed.

The Turkish Vizier thrust pipes through the noses of smokers; and the
Shah of Persia cropped the ears and slit the noses of those who made use
of the fascinating leaf. The Counterblast says of it: "And for the
vanity committed in this filthy custom, is it not both great vanity and
uncleanness, that at the table--a place of respect of cleanliness, of
modesty--men should not be ashamed to sit tossing of tobacco-pipes and
puffing of smoke, one at another, making the filthy smoke and stink
thereof to exhale athwart the dishes, and infect the air, when very
often men who abhor it are at their repast? Surely smoke becomes a
kitchen far better than a dining-chamber; and yet it makes the kitchen
oftentimes in the inward parts of man, soiling and infecting them with
an unctuous and oily kind of soot, as hath been found in some great
tobacco-takers that after their deaths were opened."

"A Counterblast to Tobacco," by James the First, King of England, was
first printed in quarto, without name or date, at London, 1616. In the
frontispiece was engraved the tobacco-smoker's coat of arms, consisting
of a blackamoor's head, cross-pipes, cross-bones, death's-head, etc. It
is not improbable that it was intended to foment the popular prejudice
against Sir Walter Raleigh, who first introduced the use of tobacco into
England, and who was put to death in the same year, 1616. King James
alludes to the introduction of the use of tobacco and of Raleigh as
follows: "It is not so