The Anatomy of Tobacco
please, skulls they are, and ere long skulls they will be, devoid of those graces which have lured many an honest man to shame and destruction—yea, even unto breaking of pipes and burning of cigars for love of a face, than which no shame can be greater or more flagitious. So much for ornament, and as to essential colour I confess I like it not, save that it be used very sparingly, and so as to make of greater effect that "accidental" colour which thy persistent smoking may impart.
Now the merits of short clay pipes are these: (1) They are light and easy to be carried in the mouth; (2) they are "an insult to decent society"—I considering "decent society" as a filthy and obscene harridan which every man does well to trample on and defy; (3) they, after long smoking, become saturated with tobacco, and so excellently sweet. But yet they are of all pipes most easy to be broken, as much for their smallness as their brittle texture. For two things being equally brittle, but one larger than the other, the larger will endure, since
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