Rhode Island American And Gazette

Tobacco and the Cholera.—The Continent is poisoned with tobacco-smoke from one end of the land to the other, and every hour of the twenty-four. That tobacco may kill insects on shrubs, and that one stench may overpower another is all possible enough; but that thousands and tens of thousands die of diseases of the lungs, and generally brought on by tobacco smoking, is a fact as well known as any in the whole history of diseases. How is it possible to be otherwise? Tobacco is a poison. A man will die of an infusion of tobacco as soon as of a shot through the head. Can inhaling this powerful narcotic in however small portions, be good for man? Its operation in these portions is to produce a sensation of giddiness and drowsiness. It inflames the mouth, and requires a perpetual flow of the saliva, a fluid known to be among the most important to the whole economy of digestion: it irritates the eyes, corrupts the breath, and excites the throat to perpetual thirst. No doubt the human frame may grow so accustomed to this drain that the smoker may go on from year to year making himself a nuisance to society; yet there can be no doubt whatever that the custom is as deleterious in general as it is filthy and un-English. A great portion of it has arisen among us from the puppyish affectation of our shop-keepers' boys and city dandies for being thought foreign Field Marshals. Every handler of tapes and ribbons turns a hussar the moment he sallies forth from behind the counter; the easily applied moustache, the fur cloak, and the cigar furnish the hero; and England rejoices in her Count Calico, and her General Gingham. The cigar speculation must be overthrown.—Monthly Magazine.