ng tobacco, and have taken to tea-leaves and neem-leaves, and
guava fruit-leaves instead, which the poor soldiers are also
constantly using." The neem-tree is better known, perhaps, as the
margosa. It yields a bitter oil, and is supposed to possess febrifugal
properties.

Among the general mass of the population in the early Victorian
period, smoking, though certainly not so all-prevailing as now, was
yet very common. It is highly probable that one of the things which
led to the great increase in pipe-smoking which took place from this
time onwards was the introduction of the briar pipe.

The earliest example of the use of a wooden pipe I have met with is
dated 1765--but this was not in England. Many years ago the late Mr.
A.J. Munby pointed out that Smollett, in one of his letters dated
March 18, 1765, giving an account of his journey from Nice to Turin,
describes how he ascended "the mountain Brovis," and on the top
thereof met a Quixotic figure, whom he thus pictures: "He was very
tall, meagre, and yellow, with a long hooked nose and twinkling eyes.
His head was cased in a woollen nightcap, over which he wore a flapped
hat; he had a silk handkerchief about his neck, and his mouth was
furnished with a short wooden pipe, from which he discharged wreathing
clouds of tobacco-smoke." This scarecrow turned out to be an Italian
marquis; and no doubt the singularity of his smoking apparatus was of
a piece with the singularity of his attire.

Mr. Munby, after this reference to Smollett's adventure, proceeded to
claim the honour of having helped to bring the use of wooden pipes
into England. In the year 1853 he wrote, "meerschaums and clays were
the rule at both the English universities and in all shops throughout
the land, and the art of making pipes of wood was either obsolete [it
had never been introduced] or wholly _in futuro_. But a college friend
of mine, a Norfolk squire, possessed a gardener who was of an
inventive turn, though he was not a Scotchman. This man conceived and
wrought out the idea of making pipes of willow-wood, cutting the bowl
out of a thick stem, and the tube out of a thinner one growing from
the bowl, so that the whole pipe was in one piece. Willow-wood is too
soft, so that the pipes did not last long; but they were a valuable
discovery, and the young squire's friends bought them eagerly at
eighteenpence apiece."

This experiment in the direction of wooden pipes was interesting, and
deserves to b