A new pipe requires great care in bringing it into use, till it is as
it is phrased, besmoked, or seasoned; that is, till the inside of the
pipe-head is coated with a black crust of finely cemented-together
tobacco dust. Till this is effected the pipe has not a good flavour,
and it requires to be well and vigorously smoked out. To promote this
seasoning, it is customary to smear the inside of the head with
sugar-water, before it is filled with tobacco. This seasoning of the
meerschaum head is particularly difficult. While it is warm, during the
first time of smoking, it must not be touched with the fingers; it must
be suffered to cool slowly, and must be protected from being touched or
rubbed by any thing.
The long pipes, called house-pipes, serve the Burschen usually at the
Kneips; the very short one, on their walks, or when out shooting, as a
long one might then be inconvenient. That there are people who
extravagantly carry their luxury so far as, from year to year, at all
times and seasons, to smoke genuine meerschaum pipes, any one may, to
his astonishment, read in Bulwer's Ernest Maltravers.
The white clay pipes, which were formerly in general use, are no longer
used by the student; but they may be daily seen in the mouths of
countrymen.
Thus we have put together a right noble pipe, and will now take a peep
at the apparatus requisite to its enjoyment. The most indispensable,
certainly, is tobacco. To lecture on the various qualities of this
article, we want both patience and sufficient knowledge. How many
descending steps are there between the finest Knaster, and the weed
which fumes up rank and qualmish from the pipe of the wood-cutter! The
worst sort is jocosely called "three times round the body for a
farthing," which may fittingly be smoked over that liquor called
"three-men wine," because it would require two men to hold a man while
the third forced this Tartarian wine down his throat.
Much luxury is expended over that little ornamental repository for the
preservation of this precious commodity--the so-called tobacco-casket
Abroad the student carries the narcotic herb with him in a
tobacco-pouch, which is often ornamented with embroidery by some fair
hand. The long and thickly-piled together strips of paper (spills),
which are used to light the pipes, are in Germany known by the name of
"Fidibus," and its derivation from "fidelibus patribus," the jolly
monks, shows that these good fellows did not despise the enjoyment of
tobacco, when they could in private breathe its beatifying fumes.
Another yet similar derivation is the following. At the time when
the students were forbidden to smoke tobacco, they had private
smoking-companies, where the host sent round a Latin bill with the
following contents, which the student who agreed to go to it,
undersigned not with his real, but with a purposely assumed name:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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