Читать книгу The Seven Sisters of Sleep. Popular History of the Seven Prevailing Narcotics of the World онлайн

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Another cloudy day arose upon London when the great plague broke out, and on this occasion, the smoke of tobacco mingled with the gloom. In Reliquiæ Hearnianæ, it is stated that “none who kept tobacconist’s shops had the plague. It is certain that smoking was looked upon as a most excellent preservative, insomuch, that even children were obliged to smoke. And I remember”, continues the writer, “that I heard formerly Tom Rogers, who was yeoman beadle, say, that when he was that year when the plague raged, a schoolboy at Eton, all the boys of that school were obliged to smoke in the school every morning, and that he was never whipped so much in his life as he was one morning for not smoking.” We may imagine the experiences of some of these urchins at their first or second attempt, and in remembrance, it may be, of some similar experience of our own, see no cause for wonder at Tom Rogers not liking to elevate his yard of clay, and view the curls of smoke arise from the ashes of the smouldering weed. Another amateur who flourished after the great fire had burnt out all traces of the great plague, has left us the record of his “day of smoke,” and the cudgelling he received for doing that which Tom Rogers was whipped for not doing—