For I hate yet love thee so,

That, whichever thing I show,
The plain truth will seem to be

A constrain'd hyperbole,

And the passion to proceed

More from a mistress than a weed.
Sooty retainer to the vine,
Bacchus' black servant, negro fine;
Sorcerer, that makest us dote upon
Thy begrimed complexion,
And for thy pernicious sake,
More and greater oaths to break
Than reclaimed lovers take

'Gainst women: thou thy siege dost lay Much too in the female way,

While thou suck'st the labouring breath Faster than kisses or than death.

Thou in such a cloud dost bind us,

That our worst foes cannot find us,

And ill fortune, that would thwart us,

Shoots at rovers, shooting at us;

While each man, through thy heightening steam,

Does like a smoking Etna seem,

And all about us does express

(Fancy and wit in richest dress)

A Sicilian fruitfulness.

Thou through such a mist dost show us,
That our best friends do not know us,
And, for those allowed features,
Due to reasonable creatures,
Liken'st us to fell chimeras-
Monsters that, who see us, fear us;
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon,
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion.
Bacchus we know, and we allow
His tipsy rites. But what art thou,
That but by reflex canst show
What his deity can do,

As the false Egyptian spell
Aped the true Hebrew miracle?

Some few vapours thou may'st raise,
The weak brain may serve to amaze,
But to the reins and nobler heart
Canst nor life nor heat impart.

Brother of Bacchus, later born,
The old world was sure forlorn
Wanting thee, that aidest more
The god's victories than before
All his panthers, and the brawls
Of his piping Bacchanals.
These, as stale, we disallow,
Or judge of thee meant only thou
His true Indian conquest art;
And, for ivy round his dart
The reformed god now weaves
A finer thyrsus of thy leaves.
Scent to match thy rich perfume
Chemic art did ne'er presume
Through her quaint alembic strain,
None so sovereign to the brain.
Nature that did in thee excel,
Framed again no second smell.
Roses, violets, but toys,

For the smaller sort of boys,
Or for greener damsels meant ;
Thou art the only manly scent.

Stinking'st of the stinking kind,

Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,

Africa, that brags her foison,
Breeds no such prodigious poison,
Henbane, nightshade, both together,
Hemlock, aconite-

Nay, rather,

Plant divine, of rarest virtue;
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you.
'Twas but in a sort I blamed thee,
None e'er prosper'd who defamed thee:
Irony all and feign'd abuse,
Such as perplex'd lovers use
At a need, when, in despair
To paint forth their fairest fair,
Or in part but to express

That exceeding comeliness
Which their fancies doth so strike,
They borrow language of dislike;
And, instead of Dearest Miss,
Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
And those forms of old admiring,
Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
Basilisk, and all that's evil,
Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor.
Monkey, Ape, and twenty more :
Friendly Traitress, Loving Foe,-
Not that she is truly so,
But no other way they know
A contentment to express,
Borders so upon excess,
That they do not rightly wot
Whether it be pain or not.

Or as men, constrain'd to part,
With what's nearest to their heart,
While their sorrow's at the height,
Lose discrimination quite,
And their hasty wrath let fall,
To appease their frantic gall,
On the darling thing whatever
Whence they feel it death to sever,
Though it be, as they, perforce,
Guiltless of the sad divorce.

For I must (nor let it grieve thee,

Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. For thy sake, Tobacco, I,

Would do anything but die,

And but seek to extend my days
Long enough to sing thy praise.
But, as she who once hath been
A king's consort, is a queen
Ever after, nor will bate
Any tittle of her state
Though a widow, or divorced,
So I, from thy converse forced,
The old name and style retain,
A right Katherine of Spain:
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys
Of the blest Tobacco Boys;
Where, though I, by sour physician,
Am debarr'd the full fruition

Of thy favours, I may catch
Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Sidelong odours, that give life
Like glances from a neighbour's wife;
And still live in the by-places
And the suburbs of thy graces;
And in thy borders take delight

An unconquer'd Canaanite.

CHARLES LAMB.

LORD BYRON ON TOBACCO.

BORNE from a short frail pipe which yet had blown
Its gentle odours over either zone,

And, puff'd where'er winds rise or waters roll,
Had wafted smoke from Portsmouth to the Pole,
Opposed its vapour as the lightning flash'd,
And reek'd, midst mountain-billows unabash'd,
To Æolus a constant sacrifice,

Thro' every change of all the varying skies.
And what was he who bore it? I may err,
But deem him sailor or philosopher.
SUBLIME TOBACCO! which from East to West
Cheers the tar's labour or the Turkman's rest;
Which on the Moslem's ottoman divides
His hours, and rivals opium and his brides;
Magnificent in Stamboul, but less grand,
Though not less loved, in Wapping or the Strand;
Divine in hookahs, glorious in a pipe,

When tipp'd with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe;
Like other charmers, wooing the caress,
More dazzlingly when daring in full dress;
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far
Thy naked beauties-give me a cigar !

SONNET TO A PIPE. (1690.)
"Doux charme de ma solitude,
Brulante pipe, ardent fourneau !
Qui purges d'humeur mon cerveau,
Et mon esprit d' inquietude.
Tabac dont mon ame est ravie,
Lorsque je te vois te perdre en l'air,
Aussi promptement q'un éclair,
Je vois l'image de ma vie ;
Tu remets dans mon souvenir,
Ce qu'un jour je dois devenir,
N'étant qu'une cendre animée;
Et tout d'un coup je m'aperçoi,
Que courant aprés ta fumée,
Je passe de même que toi."

Attributed to Esprit de Raymond, Comte de Modène.
Translation of the above.

"SWEET smoking pipe, bright glowing stove,
Companion still of my retreat,

Thou dost my gloomy thoughts remove,
And purge my brain with gentle heat.

"Tobacco, charmer of my mind,
When, like the meteor's transient gleam
Thy substance gone to air I find,
I think, alas! my life the same.

"What else but lighted dust am I?

Thou show'st me what my fate will be;

And when thy sinking ashes die,

I learn that I must end like thee."

TO A PIPE OF TOBACCO.
COME, lovely tube by friendship blest,
Belov'd and honour'd by the wise,
Come, fill'd with honest Weekly's best,
And kindled from the lofty skies.

While round me clouds of incense roll,
With guiltless joys you charm the sense,
And nobler pleasures to the soul,
In hints of moral truth, dispense.

Soon as you feel th' inlivening ray,
To dust you hasten to return;
And teach me that my earliest day,
Began to give me to the urn.

But tho' thy grosser substance sink
To dust, thy purer part aspires;
This when I see, I joy to think
That earth but half of me requires.
Like thee myself am born to die,
Made half to rise and half to fall.
O! could I while my moments fly,
The bliss you give me, give to all.
From The Gentleman's Magazine. July, 1746.

CHOOSING A WIFE BY A PIPE OF TOBACCO.

TUBE, I love thee as my life;
By thee I mean to chuse a wife,
Tube, thy colour let me find,
In her skin and in her mind

Let her have a shape as fine;
Let her breath be sweet as thine:
Let her, when her lips I kiss,
Burn like thee, to give me bliss:
Let her in some smoke or other,
All my failings kindly smother.
Often when my thoughts are low,
Send them where they ought to go.
When to study I incline

Let her aid be such as thine:
Such as thine her charming pow'r,
In the vacant social hour
Let her live to give delight,
Ever warm and ever bright:
Let her deeds, whene'er she dies,
Mount as incense to the skies.

From The Gentleman's Magazine. 1757.

And art with calmest pleasures rife ;
Heaven grant thee sunshine and warm rain,
And to thy planter health and gain.

Through thee, friend of my solitude,
With hope and patience I'm endued,
Deep sinks thy power within my heart,
And cares and sorrows all depart.

Then let non-smokers rail for ever;

Shall their hard words true friends dissever?

Pleasure's too rare to cast away

My pipe, for what the railers say !

When love grows cool, thy fire still warms me.
When friends are fled, thy presence charms me ;
If thou art full, though purse be bare,
I smoke, and cast away all care!

THE PIPE OF TOBACCO. WHY should life in sorrow be spent, When pleasure points to the road Wherein each traveller with content May throw off the ponderous load?

And instead, in ample measure,

Gather fruits too long left ripe; What's this world without its pleasure? What is pleasure but a pipe?

Is it not tobacco dear,

That from the brow fell grief can wipe? Yes! like them with jolly cheer,

I find pleasure in a pipe.

Some delight in envy ever,
Others avaricious gripe ;

Would you know our greatest pleasure? 'Tis a glowing social pipe.

Two verses omitted.

(Printed by W. J. Shelmerdine, about 1794.) From Logan's Pedlar's Pack of Ballads.

LA PIPE De Tabac.

CONTRE les chagrins de la vie,
On crie,
Et ab hoc et ab hac ;
Moi, je me crois digne d'envie,
Quand j'ai ma pipe et mon tabac.
Aujourd'hui, changeant de folie,
Ét de boussole et d'almanach,
Je préfère fille jolie,

Même à la pipe de tabac.

Le soldat bâille sous la tente,
Le matelot sur le tillac ;
Bientot ils ont l'âme contente,
Avec la pipe de tabac.
Si pourtant survient une belle
A l'instant le cœur fait tictac,
Et l'amant oublie auprès d'elle
Jusqu'à la pipe de tabac.

Quand ce grand homme allait en guerre,

Il portait dans son petit sac,

Le doux portrait de sa bergère,
Avec la pipe de tabac.

PIGAULT LEBRUN. (1755-1835.

CONTENT AND A PIPE.

CONTENTED I sit with my pint and my pipe,
Puffing sorrow and care far away,

And surely the brow of grief nothing can wipe
Like smoking and moist ning our clay;

For, though liquor can banish man's reason afar, 'Tis only a fool or a sot,

Who with reason or sense would be ever at war,
And don't know when enough he has got.
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe-and his life but smoke.

Yes, a man and a pipe are much nearer akin
Than has as yet been understood,

For, until with breath they are both fill'd within,
Pray tell me for what are they good?
They, one and the other, composed are of clay,
And, if rightly I tell nature's plan,

Take but the breath from them both quite away,
The pipe dies - and so does the man :
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe-and his life but smoke.

Thus I'm told by my pipe that to die is man's lot,
And, sooner or later, die he must;

For when to the end of life's journey he's got,
Like a pipe that's smoked out he is dust:
So you, who would wish in your hearts to be gay.
Encourage not strife, care, or sorrow,
Make much of your pipe of tobacco to-day,
For you may be smoked out to-morrow:
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe--and his life but smoke.

ANONYMOUS.

LA FEMME ET LA PIPE.

PLAINS-moi, Philippe, mon ami;
Le sort me traite en ennemi.
Un instant mon âme charmée
Sut se caresser de fumée ;

Un instant m'enivra l'amour :
Hélas! tout a fui sans rétour.
Suis-je donc né pour le malheur, Philippe?
J'ai perdu ma femme et j'ai cassé ma pipe.
Ah! combien je regrette ma pipe!

Ma femme était blanche de peau,
Ma pipe était comme un corbeau ;
Elle était simple et pas bégueule ;
Je m'en servais en brûle-gueule :
Avec elles deux je chauffais

Mon lit, mes doigts et mon palais !
Suis-je donc né pour le malheur, etc.

In thy kisses, Truest blisses

Ever dwell.

Faithful ever,
Pouting never-
Ah! 'tis well,

Pipe, my darling,

Fate is snarling

Let her snarl

ON THE PLEASURE OF A PIPE.

CHARM of the solitude I love;
My pleasing, my glowing stove!
My head of rheum is purged by thee;
My heart of vain anxiety.

Tobacco favourite of my soul !

When round my head thy vapours roll;
When lost in air they vanish too,
An emblem of my life I view.

I view, and, hence instructed, learn
To what myself shall shortly turn:
Myself, a kindled coal to-day,

That wastes in smoke, and flees away.
Swiftly as these-confusing thought-
Alas! I vanish into naught.

From Cope's Tobacco Plant. December, 1871.

MY AFTER-DINNER CLOUD.

SOME Sombre evening, when I sit
And feed in solitude at home,
Perchance an ultra-bilious fit

Paints all the world an orange chrome.

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