Birmingham.
_Snuff and Tobacco._--It is perhaps not generally known that the custom of
taking snuff is of Irish origin. In a "Natural History of Tobacco," in the
_Harleian Misc._, i. 535., we are told that--
"The Virginians were observed to have pipes of clay before ever the
English came there; and from those barbarians we Europeans have
borrowed our mode and fashion of smoking.... _The Irishmen do most
commonly powder their tobacco, and snuff it up their nostrils_, which
some of our Englishmen do, who often chew and swallow it."
That the clay pipe was the original smoking apparatus in England, is
evident from the following lines in Skelton's _Eleanor Rummin_. After
lamenting the knavery of that age compared with King Harry's time, he
continues:
"Nor did that time know,
To puff and to blow,
In a peece of white clay,
As you do at this day,
With fier and coale,
And a leafe in a hole," &c.
These lines are from an edition of 1624, printed in the _Harl. Misc._, i.
415. Skelton died in 1529, and according to the generally received
accounts, tobacco was not introduced into this country till 1565, or
thereabouts; so the lines cannot be Skelton's. They are part of an
introduction to the tale of _Eleanor Rummin_. Is the author known?