From Chapter 8: smoking was frowned upon, even in places where hitherto it had been allowed. In 1812 the authorities of Sion College ordered "that Coffee and Tea be provided in the Parlour for the Visitors and Incumbents, and in the Court Room for the Curates and Lecturers; and that Pipes and Tobacco be not allowed; and that no Wine be at any time carried into the Court Room, nor any into the Hall after Coffee and Tea shall have been ordered on that day."
The use
of tobacco for
smoking, as I have said, had reached its nadir—in the fashionable world, that is to say—but the dawn follows the darkest hour, and the revival of
smoking was at hand, thanks to the cigar.
From Chapter 13: The scene is a tavern interior. Around the table are four men and a woman, while a boy approaches carrying two huge measures of ale. One man is
smoking furiously, while on the table lie three other pipes—one for each man—and sundry pots and glasses. The woman is plainly a convivial soul; but there is no pipe for her, and such provision was no doubt unusual.
T here is direct evidence, too, besides the story in the first paragraph of this chapter, that women disliked the prevalence of
smoking. In Marston's "Antonio and Mellinda," 1602, Rosaline, when asked by her uncle when she will marry, makes the spirited reply—"Faith, kind uncle, when men abandon jealousy, forsake taking
of tobacco, and cease to wear their beards so rudely long. Oh, to have a husband with a mouth continually
smoking, with a bush of furs on the ridge of his chin, readie still to flop into his foaming chops, 'tis more than most intolerable;" and similar indications of dislike to
smoking could be quoted from other plays.
On the other hand, it is certain that from comparatively early in the seventeenth century there were to be found here and there women who smoked.
On the title-page of Middleton's comedy, "The Roaring Girle," 1611, is a picture of the heroine, Moll Cutpurse, in man's apparel,
smoking a pipe, from which a great cloud of smoke is issuing.
