signalised himself and his reign by profound learning and ponderous invective hurled against the innocent plant, amongst whose alluring leaves there lurked the ‘lively image and pattern of hell.’ His _Counterblaste_ to tobacco[9] is of itself an historic monument to his genius, which posterity does well to preserve that there may be something in hand to attest the just appreciation of his ‘loving subjects’ in early recognising in him a Solomon! Though, to be sure, some will have it that the irreverent Henri Quatre was the first to see the fitness of the designation, Solomon, for the son of Mary, Queen of Scots. And yet his astute minister, the Duc de Sully, professed to have discovered in the flickering illuminations of this northern light ‘the wisest fool in Christendom.’ Historians who think it incumbent upon them to explain every human phenomenon or prodigy, have perplexed themselves with vain endeavours to unravel this curious compound of Machiavellian craft, fussy self-conceit and imbecility. Looking to his preternatural insight into the uncanny domain of the Black Arts, his mental conflicts with the de’il, witches and warlocks, and long nebbit things, the problem his character presents might perhaps form a fitting study for the modern school of psychology. With the beginning of the seventeenth century commenced a literary warfare over the virtues and vices of St Nicotine, which lasted intermittently down to the present day. Mr. Solly, of St. Thomas’s Hospital, in the middle of last century strove valiantly in the columns of the _Lancet_ to get up a crusade against smoking. All the leading members of the medical profession took part in the affray; irrefragable statistics were piled up one upon the other as ramparts from behind which Mr. Solly proclaimed that there was death in the pipe; and the rapid degeneracy of the human race, to him everywhere apparent, was to be regarded as the inevitable consequence of indulgence in the pernicious weed. Had Mr. Solly referred to the text-book left by the royal founder of his faith, he would have learned the right use and value of trenchant utterance, and as a physiologist, would have gained knowledge never imparted in St. Thomas’s Hospital. [Illustration: DUC DE SULLY]