“What is the smoking of tobacco,” the king continued, “or as some say lately, combining the two words into one in an absurd fashion, tobacco-smoking? As if we could say nose-blowing”—had he noticed Dr. Monardes? My gaze quickly met Dr. Monardes’ for a moment—“privy-going or book-reading, just like those unintelligible Germanic peoples, who combine so many words into one that I’ve heard an entire pilgrimage to Jerusalem can be described by a single word in their language.”
“Yes,” I thought to myself. “Will-o’-the-wisp-chasing.”
“What, ipso facto, shall we say, then, about this custom?” James continued. “Learned gentlemen, I would say this is a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless.”
Applause burst out once again. Dr. Monardes was also applauding. Mr. Frampton, however, kept on as before. “You can always tell an experienced man”—I thought to myself. That’s what experience is — you do one and the same thing, since it works. When and if it stops working, all of a sudden it turns out that you know nothing.
“And what effect does this vile custom of tobacco-smoking have on our subjects? It has a categorically and unambiguously bad effect on our subjects. Because tobacco-smoke is very pernicious unto their bodies, too profluvious for many of their purses, and most pestiferous to the public State. It gives our proud nation a bad name. But are these statements of mine simply being made ipse dixit, unproven by facts? Gentlemen, I was aghast to read in a book by the French traveler Sorbière, who recently visited our beautiful capital city of London — primarily to spy, which we pretended not to know and good-humoredly turned a blind eye to, so as not to sour our relations with our French “cousins”—I was aghast to read that in his opinion the English were naturally lazy and spent half their time in taking tobacco. And if you object that we could expect nothing more from a French spy and from a Frenchman in general — that is, a representative of a nation famed for its superficiality and frivolity — then I will respond that our fellow countryman and friend Sir Grey Palmes makes the same and even more frightening claims when he states absolutely categorically that if tobacco be not banished, it will overthrow one hundred thousand men in England, for now it is so common that he, Sir Grey, has seen ploughmen take it as they are at plough.”
A muted “oooh” swept through the hall like grumbling, but I couldn’t discern whether it was because of the ploughmen who smoked at plough, or because of the implicit threat of tobacco being banished. Probably both, since it seemed to me that everyone looked shocked.
“Yes, yes, gentlemen,” the king went on. “Tobacco is far from being the innocent peccadillo of our learned class. On the contrary, it has penetrated deeply, and perhaps even more deeply, within our common people and has turned into a mass contagion. I now have the honor,” he turned to the side, “to introduce to you the learned man Joshua Sylvester, who can recount for you even more shocking examples and whose name is perhaps familiar to our learned audience because of his work”—here, the king looked down at the notes in front of him and made a long pause—“his work ‘Tobacco Battered and the Pipes Shattered’ and so on. I am certain that he himself will state the full title of his work, which I enthusiastically recommend. Please, gentlemen, a round of applause for the scholar Joshua Sylvester.”
The following moment, a little twerp dressed all in black took the podium, a man simply impossible to describe, since he was so nondescript — it was as if he were disappearing or melting away like a spot before your eyes, with the exception, however, of his exceptionally malevolent, angry, glittering eyes. He bowed to the king, who had retired to his place behind a long table on the platform, and then turned to the audience — Joshua, that is — with the words: “Most honorable gentlemen, the work, which his Majesty condescended to mention, is called ‘Tobacco Battered and the Pipes Shattered about their Eares, that idely Idolize so base and barbarous a Weed, or at least overlove so loathsome a Vanity, by a Volley of Holy Shot Thundered from Mount Helicon.’”
Did I really write that down correctly?
“In what sense?” A voice from the audience called.
“In the sense that tobacco is battered and pipes shattered by a volley of holy shot thundered from Mount Helicon,” Joshua replied. “Meant for the ears of those that idly idolize so base and barbarous a weed, and so forth. This latter is a parenthetical remark.”
“Aha,” I heard the voice of my neighbor Isaac Wake, who was nodding his head as he wrote something on the sheets in front of him.
“Learned gentlemen, I have personally witnessed,” Joshua continued, “an even more shocking example than a ploughman with a pipe in his mouth. Once I was clerk to a curate in Lincolnshire, who was accustomed to retiring to the vestry before the sermon and there smoke a pipe while the congregation sang a psalm — usually the twenty-first. One Sunday, he could not resist the diabolical temptation of his vile habit and smoked a second pipe. Since the congregation in the meantime was confused and grumbling, I went in to him and warned him that the people were getting impatient, but he replied: ‘Let them sing another psalm.’ ‘They have, sir,’ I replied. Only then, with a sigh and great dissatisfaction did he extinguish his pipe and go out before the congregation, to whom, incidentally, he preached a sermon on the subject ‘How important it is to do things quickly and not to put them off until tomorrow,’ and to provide a personal example of this, his sermon was quite short, after which he dismissed the congregation and went back into his vestry to finish smoking his pipe.”
The mixed sound of murmurs of discontent and suppressed laughter swept through the audience following Joshua’s words. Even my neighbor Isaac gave a faint smile.
“A striking example,” the king called at that moment, “of the sluggishness that has recently seized some representatives of our clergy and how they are in a position to neglect their holy duties because of a barbarous plant.”
“Precisely,” Joshua nodded. “And all for a stinking, fuming and not only useless, but clearly harmful weed. Yes, harmful. Because our learned physicians, who praise its healing properties to the skies, are frankly and undoubtedly mistaken. Actually, how frank this really is, I couldn’t say,” Joshua noted almost as an aside. “But I have no doubts whatsoever that it is undoubted. Gentlemen,” he began again, “contrary to their claims, tobacco has harmful and poisonous qualities! Because when it is taken into the body, tobacco vexes and unsettles it, inducing the powerful purging of distillations in both directions, above and below, it induces spiritual confusion, as well as torpor and dullness of the senses and limbs. Its torpid and dulling qualities are most noticeable when the fumes are taken through the mouth, since then it induces drunken dizziness in the head, and if a great quantity is consumed, it leads to a dull clumsiness of the senses and limbs.”
What kind of nonsense was this? I looked at Isaac’s paper to see if I had understood correctly — but yes, he, too, had written down the same thing. How absurd! I personally never experience any dulling of the limbs and senses at all after a cigarella. On the contrary, even!