When a pipe tastes acrid it requires more than ordinary cleaning. If one has the opportunity a most excellent way is to blow steam through it, first removing the mouthpiece. Another way recommended by a smoker who says it is most efficacious is to fit a cork into the bowl of the pipe. Make a hole in the cork, into which the nozzle of a soda siphon will fit snugly. Direct the mouthpiece into some emptying vessel and force about a wine glass of the soda water from the siphon through the pipe. It will clean it out effectively. If you are smoking a meerschaum and desire it to color well and evenly it is a good plan to use a false upper bowl to fit inside the bowl of your pipe. The rim of fire where the tobacco is burning makes the pipe bowl too hot and does not allow that part to color. The false bowl will prevent this. Some smokers think that covering a meerschaum bowl with chamois will cause it to color well. The chamois will not aid the coloring but it will protect the bowl from being touched by the hand during the process and thus avoiding a spotty effect, particularly if the hand should be moist or greasy. During the progress of the coloring the pipe should never be allowed to get too hot. The time required to color a pipe depends on the tobacco used. If it is a rich oily tobacco, the time necessary is shorter than with a dry tobacco. Imitation meerschaum of the cheaper kind are sometimes artificially colored by the makers. This is done by boiling the pipe in an oily solution of nicotine, the formula for which as given in the _American Druggist_, V. 58, is: Crude nicotine (oil of tobacco)==[ounce] i. Olive oil==[ounce] ii. Yellow wax==[ounce] viii. The pipe is kept in the boiling solution from 10 to 15 minutes and rapidly absorbs it. The surface is capable of a high polish. REFERENCES PENN, W. A. _The Soverane Herbe: a History of Tobacco._ London and New York, 1901. FAIRHOLT, F. W. _Tobacco; its History and Associations._ London, 1876. CHAPTER XVII EFFECTS OF TOBACCO SMOKING ON THE HUMAN SYSTEM PHYSICAL EFFECTS. OPINIONS OF MEDICAL MEN QUOTED AND DISCUSSED. EFFECTS OF TOBACCO SMOKING ON THE HUMAN SYSTEM