Queen Elizabeth against the use and abuse of tobacco, dated 1584—the year Raleigh’s first expedition sailed to the New World. It is amusing to find Queen Elizabeth fulminating against the pipe she afterwards so willingly countenanced in the mouth of her favourite knight. But then Sir Walter was in every way a splendid man, the typical gallant and hero in England’s heroic age. Tall, dark, handsome, a noble brow, commanding voice and mien, he drew to his side willing hands ready to do his behest, be it what it might. A gay courtier, his dress was of the richest, and priceless gems sparkled on every finger. And so it came about that his proud Queen would quietly sit by his side, would playfully call him Walter, and listen to his tales of daring deeds and sufferings endured all for Good Queen Bess. And had he not won for her a new land full of rich promise, which, for her sake, was named Virginia? And thus they would talk on, Sir Walter smoking his finely-wrought silver pipe in peace, forgetful of the fair, if frail, Maid of Honour, Bessy Throgmorton, listening, maybe, behind the arras. Alas! poor mortal man. The untoward affair at last broke upon Elizabeth like a thunderstorm in a serene sky, and our gallant hero became an outcast from the favour of his Queen.[7] Among the many anecdotes told of Raleigh’s practices with his pipe may be mentioned that of his outwitting the Queen in a wager she laid with the gallant knight respecting the weight of the smoke which exhaled from a pipeful of tobacco. ‘I can assure your Majesty,’ said Raleigh, ‘that I have so well experienced the nature of it that I can exactly tell even the weight of the smoke in any quantity I consume.’ ‘I doubt it much, Sir Walter,’ replied Elizabeth, thinking only how impossible it must be to catch the smoke and put it in a balance, ‘and will wager you twenty angels that you do not solve my doubt.’ Whereupon Raleigh drew forth a quantity of the weed, placed it in finely adjusted scales, and having ascertained its weight, commenced to smoke it, carefully preserving the ashes. These at the finish he weighed with great exactness. Then would it dawn upon her Majesty how the wager was to end. ‘Your Majesty,’ said Raleigh, ‘cannot deny that the difference hath evaporated in smoke.’ ‘Truly, I cannot,’ was her reply. Then, turning to those around her, who were eying with amusement this curious play on the pipe, she continued, ‘Many labourers in the fire have I heard of (alluding to alchemists) who turned their gold into smoke, but Sir Walter is the first who has turned smoke into gold.’ But the Indian weed had a hard fight to hold its ground in Europe and Asia in face of the most resolute opposition from potentates, statesmen, and priests. In England The gentleman called King James In quilted doublet and great trunk breeches, Who held in abhorrence tobacco and witches,[8]