the Persians; but Magnenus rather
attributes it to the Dutch and English, to the latter of whom attaches
the credit of having invented the clay pipes of modern times. Some
writers have concluded that the plant served as a narcotic in some
parts of Asia. Liebault thinks it was known in Europe[32] many years
before the discovery of the New World, and asserts that the plant had
been found in the Ardennes. Magnenus, however, claims its origin as
transatlantic and affirms as his belief that the winds had doubtless
carried the seeds from one continent to the other. Pallos says that
among the Chinese, and among the Mongol tribes who had the most
intercourse with them, the custom of smoking is so general, so
frequent, and has become so indispensable a luxury; the tobacco purse
affixed to their belt so necessary an article of dress; the form of
the pipes, from which the Dutch seem to have taken the model of
theirs, so original; and, finally, the preparation of the leaves so
peculiar, that they could not possibly derive all this from America by
way of Europe, especially as India, where the practice of smoking is
not so general, intervenes between Persia and China. Meyen also states
that the consumption of tobacco in the Chinese empire is of immense
extent, and the practice seems to be of great antiquity, "for on very
old sculptures I have observed the very same tobacco pipes which are
still used." Besides, we now know that the plant which furnishes the
Chinese tobacco is even said to grow wild in the East Indies.

[Footnote 32: James the First also inclines to this
belief, declaring tobacco to be "a common herb which
(though under divers names) grows almost everywhere."]

"Tobacco," says Loudon, "was introduced into the county of
Cork, with the potatoe, by Sir Walter Raleigh." A quaint
writer of this period says of the plant: "Tobacco, that
excellent plant, the use whereof (as of fifth element) the
world cannot want, is that little shop of Nature, wherein
her whole workmanship is abridged; where you may see earth
kindled into fire, the fire breathe out an exhalation, which
entering in at the mouth walks through the regions of a
man's brain, drives out all ill vapors but itself, draws
down all bad humors by the mouth, which in time might breed
a scab over the whole body, if already they have not; a
plant of singular use; for, on