Juniata Sentinel

Tobacco-Its Effects on the Human Constitution, Physical, Intellectual and Moral.

BY JAMES COULTER LAYARD, M. D.

[CONTINUED.]

THE EXPENSE.

Then there is the deterioration of the land devoted to its production. which, as we already remarked, is greater beyond comparison than that resulting from any other crop. Any one who smokes a cigar will notice the large amount of ashes which is left. More ashes are left from the combustion of tobacco than from that of any other vegetable substances, 1,000 pounds of tobacco leave on an average 200 pounds of ashes. The oils, resins, and acids which tobacco contains are derived from the atmosphere. and hence cost nothing : but the ash is composed of mineral matters. and is hence made up from the available plant food of the soil. A crop of tobacco- 2,000 pounds to the acre-withdraws from every acre of land on which it grows 400 pounds of this constituent.- A crop of wheat-30 bushels to the acre-withdraws from the soil 36 pounds. Thus we see that one crop of tobacco does as much damage to the land on which it grows as would 11 crops of wheat! One year's farming of your land in tobacco injures it as much as 11 years farming of it in wheat! You can take but two or three crops of tobacco from your land before it is well nigh ruined for that purpose and for every other, until the soil has been renovated. And tobacco can be grown with profit on none but the best soils. Says Prof. Brewer, "A man may get rich raising tobacco, but a nation never will. A writer in Blackwood's Magazine years ago called attention to this matter, pointing to the blasted tobacco lands of Maryland and Virginia as examples. The Rev. Dr. Hawes, in his sermon before alluded to. predicted that the Connecticut Valley would, in time, become as barren as those.

As to the value of property destroyed by fires resulting from lighted cigars and pipes, and from the still burning matches which had been used to light cigars and pipes, we can form no reliable estimate. because we cannot tell with any degree of certainty to what extent conflagrations are due to this cause. We read nearly every week of fires. the origin of which is chronicled as unknown. How many of these result from the cause we are considering it is, of course, impossible to tell : yet the attempt has been made to estimate the amount relatively. "One- third, or more, of all the fires in my circuit," says an insurance agent, "have originated from matches and pipes! Fires in England and fires in America are kindled with alarming frequency by smokers casting about firebrands " Facts in abundance substantiate this. From Harper's Weekly we learn that in the forenoon of July 30, last year, a workman on a canal boat lying at the dock of the Standard Oil Company, at Hunter's Point, lighted his pipe and threw the burning match on the floor Every plank of the boat was saturated with oil, and the air was full of inflammable vapor.- The boat was instantly enveloped in flames, which communicated to the works on shore, where were stored 14,000 barrels of oil and all were consumed together.

A fire very similar to the above in its origin, progress and results, occurred about the beginning of the year 1870 at Marseilles, France. A man standing on the deck of a vessel used to convey naphtha and kerosene, having lighted his cigar, dropped the burning match at his feet and thereby started a conflagration that consumed property valued at not less than a million of dollars.

A conflagration in San Francisco some years ago, kindled by a lighted cigar destroyed millions of dollars' worth.

A most destructive fire occurred not long since in England, upon one of the Duke of Northumberland's farms, near Alnwick, in which barns. stables and other buildings, with their contents. also a large quantity of grain in stacks, were totally consumed. This was caused by some burning tobacco which fell from the pipe of a laborer upon the straw.

The magazine in the barracks of Buenos Ayres exploded on the 29th of December, 1839, killing 126 soldiers and many women and children. Just before the explosion occurred, one of the men was observed smoking in a room where several cases of powder were stored.

A great conflagration on land, wherein human life is endangered, is sufficiently appalling; but how much more appalling is a fire at sea, with the prospect on one hand of being burned to death and on the other of being drowned : in either case finding a watery grave. The steamer Glasgow was burned at sea on the 30th of July, 1869 The fire originated from a lighted fuse which one of the steerage passengers had used to light his pipe, and afterward thrown into the hold where cotton was stored The passengers, 250 in number, were rescued by the Rosamond, Capt. Wallis, bound for New York But the vessel and cargo proved a total loss.