Well do I remember the immense care which devotees of tobacco used to take, when sallying forth in the country to enjoy it, not to allow the faintest whiff of smoke to penetrate into the hall as they lit their cigars at the door. The whole thing was really ridiculous, but I suppose it would have still been going on had it not been for our present King, who most sensibly took the lead in promoting the toleration of what is, after all, a great addition to the pleasures of life. Besides this, there can be no doubt that the cigarette-smoking now practically universally prevalent after lunch and dinner has been a considerable factor in the direction of temperance, and has ended the practice of consuming large quantities of wine, which in old days was more or less universal. On the whole, I believe that smoking does more good than harm, in spite of the attacks sometimes levelled against it. Cigarettes, of course, are a modern invention, but I believe they already existed in a slightly different form at the beginning of the nineteenth century, when old Peninsular officers used to smoke tobacco rolled up tight in a piece of paper. They called this a _papelito_, and I fancy it was much the same thing as a cigarette. The exact time when cigars were introduced into England seems very uncertain. In _Westward Ho!_ Charles Kingsley pictures Amyas Leigh smoking a cigar, and it is to be presumed that he had authority for this. At the same time it is quite clear that cigars were hardly known in England at all as late as 1730, for the writer of a book published about that time, when describing the adventures of certain English sailors taken prisoners by a Spanish pirate in South America, notes with special astonishment that the captives were presented with “segars,” of which he gives a detailed description. The greatest traditionary smoker is, of course, Dr. Parr, whose motto is said to have been, “No pipe—no Parr.” He is also declared to have once very wittily told a lady, who had triumphantly prevented him from indulging in his beloved tobacco, that “she was the greatest tobacco stopper in England.” VIII London of the past—Eccentricities of modern architecture—Dreary modern streets—Decay of the picturesque—The dignity of old London—“The only running footman”—Berkeley Square and its memories—Lady Cowper—Lord and Lady Haversham—Charles Street and Mayfair—Curzon Street and Piccadilly—Wimborne House—A great party—Changes since the ’sixties—The last of the apothecaries—Lady Londonderry—The Sultan and his Ambassadress —Shadows of the past.