The Social History of SmokingApperson, George Latimer
History
The Social History of Smoking
Apperson, George Latimer
Smoking
I am indebted for this quotation to a correspondent of _Notes and
Queries_, September 27, 1913.
Another correspondent of the same journal, Colonel W.F. Prideaux, also
replying to a query of mine, wrote: "Before briar-root pipes came into
common use clay pipes were of necessity smoked by all classes. When I
matriculated at Oxford at the Easter of 1858 ... University men used
to be rather particular about the pipes they smoked. The finest were
made in France, and the favourite brand was 'Fiolet, Saint Omer.' I do
not know if this kind is still smoked, but it was made of a soft clay
that easily coloured. In taverns, of course, the churchwarden--beloved
of Carlyle and Tennyson--was usually smoked to the accompaniment of
shandygaff. At Simpson's fish ordinary at Billingsgate these pipes
were always placed on the table after dinner, together with screws of
shag tobacco, and a smoking parliament moistened with hot or cold
punch according to the season, was generally held during the following
hour. Of course, in those days no one ever thought of smoking a pipe
in the presence of ladies."
Colonel Harold Malet at the same time wrote--"When I was a cadet at
Sandhurst in 1855-58, Milo's cutty pipes were quite the thing, and the
selection by cadets of a good one out of a fresh consignment packed
in sawdust was eagerly watched by the 'Johns.' Of course we were
imitating our parents." It was no doubt these cutty pipes which are
referred to in one of the sporting books of Robert Surtees as the
"clay pipes of gentility."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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