w furnish stimulation and sociability.

[Sidenote: Tobacco, 1573]

"In these times," wrote Harrison, "the taking-in of the smoke of an
Indian herb called 'Tobaco' by an instrument formed like a little ladle
. . . is greatly taken up and used in England against rewmes [colds]
and some other diseases." Like other drugs, tobacco soon came to be
used as a narcotic for its own sake, and was presently celebrated as
"divine tobacco" and "our holy herb nicotian" by the poets. What,
indeed, are smoking, drinking, and other wooings of pure sensation at
the sacrifice of power and reason, but a sort of pragmatized poetry?
Some ages, and those the most poetical, like that of Pericles and that
of Rabelais, have deified intoxication and sensuality; others, markedly
our own, have preferred the accumulation of wealth and knowledge to
sensual indulgence. It is a psychological contrast of importance.

Could we be suddenly transported on Mr. Wells's time machine four
hundred years back we should be less struck by what our ancestors had
than by what they lacked. Quills took the place of fountain pens,
pencils, typewriters and dictaphones. Not only was postage dearer but
there were no telephones or telegrams to supplement it. The world's
news of yesterday, which we imbibe with our morning cup, then sifted
down slowly through various media of {499} communication, mostly oral.
It was two months after the battle before Philip of Spain knew the fate
of his own Armada. The houses had no steam heat, no elevators; the
busy housewife was aided by no vacuum cleaner, sewing machine and gas
ranges; the business man could not ride to his office, nor the farmer
to his market, in automobiles. There were neither railways nor
steamships to make travel rapid and luxurious.

[Sidenote: Travel]

Nevertheless, journeys for purposes of piety, pleasure and business
were common. Pilgrimages to Jerusalem, Rome, Compostella, Loretto,
Walsingham and many other shrines were frequent in Catholic countries.
Students were perpetually wandering from one university to another:
merchants were on the road, and gentlemen felt the attractions of
sight-seeing. The cheap and common mode of locomotion was on foot.
Boats on the rivers and horses on land furnished the alternatives. The
roads were so poor that the horses were sometimes "almost shipwrecked."
The trip from Worms to Rome commonly took twelve days, but could be
made in seven. Xavier's voyage from Lisbon