oval and irregular at their edges, and instead of
running together by mutual attraction, a good
sign of their physical health, they lie loosely
scattered before the eye, and indicate to the
learned observer, as clearly as though they spoke
to him, that the man from whom they were taken
is physically depressed and deplorably deficient
both in muscular and mental power. Think of
that, ye insatiable smokers, who can never arrive
at pipe or cigar the last!

Another of the doctor's propositions will be
more readily accepted: that tobacco-smoking
should never be indulged in until the body
is fully developed. During the early periods
of life, when the youth is approaching to his
manhood, all the physical and mental energies
are at their full stretch to attain a certain
maximum of growth and power. To throw
obstacles, therefore, in the way of this
development, is necessarily to inflict on it a
penalty which is life-enduring, and is never
made up; and Dr. Richardson does not think
the anti-tobacconists are saying a word too much,
when they urge that the increasing indulgence
by our children and youths in the use of tobacco
is stunting the national growth, deforming the
national life, degrading the national intellect,
and establishing a race which must necessarily
possess a limited force, and transmit its own
degradation to the next and the next generation.
If, indeed, there be one point upon which
parental authority should be specially exercised,
it is, he believes, in forbidding the use of tobacco
until the child has become a full-grown man, and
is capable of exercising his own independent and
manly judgment.

In order to reason from clear and precise
data, Dr. Richardson informs us what tobacco-
smoke is. The chemistry of tobacco had hitherto
been mainly written on the basis of experiments
made to determine the properties of tobacco-
leaf, without reference to the peculiar mode by
which the leaf is decomposed in a pipe or a
cigar. He therefore constructed a small pair
of bellows on a principle which made them act
exactly as the lips and chest of a smoker do in
the process of smoking. The bellows drew in
air, in small whiffs. Part of the smoke produced
by the combustion was allowed to escape
from the mouth of the pipe or the lighted end
of the cigar, as occurs in ordinary smoking,
while the remaining portion of smoke, which in
the man would be taken into the mouth or
lungs, was drawn into the bellows, and subjected
to analysis.

Although the widest differences prevail in
respect to the products arising from differing
cigars, differing kinds of tobacco, and differing
pipes, it is to be observed that such differences
are due to quantity rather than to quality, and
that in every variety there are present certain
bodies of which the smoke may be said to be
composed.

First, there is in all tobacco-smoke a certain
amount of water vapour, which may be considered
as innocuous, unless it be the bearer of soluble
substances which possess active properties.
Secondly, there is present a small portion of
free carbon, whose existence may be proved by
the mere act of driving the smoke through
cotton wool. The carbon is deposited as a fine
powder on the cotton fibre, rendering it dark and
dusty. It is to the presence of this that the blue
colour of the smoke is due. Those dense clouds
which the energetic smoker blows forth, and
those delicate eddies, ripples, and curves, which
the artist in tobacco watches with so gratified
an eye, are all due to an almost infinitesimal
trace of free carbon. It is this carbon which,
in confirmed smokers, settles on the back part
of the throat, and on the lining membrane of
the bronchial tubes, creating often a copious
secretion, which it discolours almost to a coaly
appearance. Thirdly, there is in the smoke a
portion of ammonia, which plays a very important
part. It is the ammonia that bites the tongue
after long smoking; it is the ammonia that
makes the smoker's tongue and throat dry,
inducing him to drink as he smokes, and that
partly excites the salivary glands to secrete so
freely. The ammonia also asserts an influence
on the blood. Fourthly; carbonic acid
is always present. This may be shown by
dipping the bowl of a pipe holding burning
tobacco, for a few seconds, in a long bottle
containing a little fresh lime-water. After the space
in the bottle is charged with smoke, withdraw
the bowl, insert the stopper of the bottle, and
shake the lime-water briskly, so as to bring it
into contact with the vapour. The lime-water
will become of milky whiteness, owing to the
formation of carbonate of lime. The tobacco-
smoke must not be driven into the lime-water
by the breath, as the breath contains carbonic
acid. The sleepiness which follows on the
prolonged inhalation of tobacco-fumes, as well as
the headache and lassitude, may be fairly attributed
to this agent, which, in so small a proportion
as five per cent in air inspired, produces the
symptoms specified. Fifthly; there is yielded
from tobacco-smoke a product having an oily
appearance, called by Vauquelin "nicotine."
On examination, however, it is found to be a
compound body, and the term nicotine is not
now applied to it in the manner suggested by the
above-named chemist. The "oil" derived from
tobacco by condensation, possesses poisonous
properties. Sufficient may be obtained from an
Havannah cigar, weighing sixty-three grains, to
excite poisonous, but not fatal symptoms in a
rabbit. The "oil" yields, on further analysis,
evidence of the presence of three bodies: a fluid
alkaloid body, called nicotine; a volatile
substance having an empyreumatic odour; and an
extract, of a dark resinous character, having a
bitter taste. Respecting these, it may be
briefly stated that all symptoms of tremor,
palpitation, and paralysis, after smoking, seem
to depend on the nicotine; the peculiar smell of
stale tobacco-smoke, which hangs so long on
the breath of the smoker, and on articles of
clothing, is derived from the volatile
empyreumatic substance; and the nauseous sharp
taste recognised by every unpractised smoker