er
containing several heads of solid advyces and Counsells to friends"
sent by Irish Quakers, was read. These counsels abound with amusingly
prim suggestions. Among them is the warning to "take heed of being
overcome with strong drink or tobacco, which many by custome are
brought into bondag to the creature." The Aberdeen Friends themselves
a little later were greatly concerned at the increasing indulgence in
"superfluous apparell and in vain recreations among the young ones";
and in 1698 they issued a paper dealing in great detail with matters
of dress and deportment. Among a hundred other things treated with
minutest particularity, the desire is expressed that "all Idle and
needless Smoaking of Tobacco be forborn."

William Penn did not like tobacco and was often annoyed by it in
America. Clarkson, his biographer, relates that on one occasion Penn
called to see some old friends at Burlington, who had been smoking,
but who, in consideration for his feelings, had put their pipes away.
Penn smelt the tobacco, and noticing that the pipes were concealed,
said, "Well, friends, I am glad that you are at last ashamed of your
old practice." "Not entirely so," replied one of the company, "but we
preferred laying down our pipes to the danger of offending a weaker
brother."

Many of the tobacco-boxes used in the latter part of the seventeenth
century were imported from Holland. They were long or oval and were
usually made of brass. They can be easily identified by their engraved
subjects and Dutch inscriptions. An example in the Colchester Museum
is made of copper and brass, with embossed designs and inscriptions,
representing commerce, &c., on the base and lid. It has engraved on
the sides the name and address of its owner--"Barnabas Barker,
Wyvenhoe, Essex." The similar boxes later made in England usually had
embossed ornamentation.

The local authorities in our eastern counties seem to have had some
curious ideas of their own as to where tobacco should or should not be
smoked. In a previous chapter we have seen that at Norwich, ale-house
keepers were fined for permitting smoking in their houses. At
Methwold, Suffolk, the folk improved upon this. The court-books of the
manor of Methwold contain the following entry made at a court held on
October 4, 1695: "We agree that any person that is taken smoakeinge
tobacco in the street shall forfitt one shillinge for every time so
taken, and itt shall be lawfull for the petty constab