habitual companions, and the ladies of China
seldom abandon their pipes except to the keeping
of their immediate attendants. The pipes
are long, light, delicate tubes, whose bowls are
scarcely larger than sparrows' eggs, into which
they press a bright yellow, but weak tobacco,
cut into very small shreds. The pipe nearly
reaches from the lips to the ground; it is
sometimes slightly ornamented, but never in the same
degree as the chibouk of the Levant. Chinawomen
are found smoking in their houses, sitting
at their doors, and walking through the streets;
but in the south, though the small-footed women
sometimes sally out with their pipes, I do not
remember seeing them smoke in public.

Tobacco and pipe-shops are found in all the
streets of China, and the opium pipe is as freely
exhibited as any other. The bowl of the opium
pipe is in the centre, not at the end. The
quantity of opium employed is scarcely larger
than the head of a pin, and is exhausted in three
whiffs by a strong inhalation, after which the
smoker generally reclines to enjoy the dreamy
influence of the pleasure-waking narcotic. Those
addicted to the use of Ya-pien (opium) seldom
use the Yen (tobacco). There is a considerable
variety of quality and price in tobacco. Among
the few courtesies which the Commissioner Yeh
was willing to receive from Western barbarians
during his imprisonment, one was a supply of
tobacco of the particular character he had been
accustomed to use. When he had exhausted his
own stock, his pride would not at first allow him
to ask a favour at the hands of his captors, but
he suffered so much from the absence of his
usual luxury, that he applied to the British
authorities to obtain for him some of that especial
"weed" which he honoured with his patronage.

The best Syrian tobacco, generally allowed to
be superior to all others, is the Latakia, produced
in the neighbourhood of the city of that name,
the ancient and renowned port of Laodicea, and
which, to the present day, has a not inconsiderable
trade. It lies at the foot of Mount Lebanon,
not far from the spot where the remnants of
the patriarchal cedars still grow in greater
abundance than in any other part of the mountains,
though that abundance has been much
curtailed by the destroying visitations of time.
And as Syria provides the finest tobacco in the
world, the Prince of Syria, the Emir Bekir,
had the reputation, and most deservedly, of
furnishing to his guests a pipe of tobacco far
more complete than any which could be
furnished by any rival potentate in the East. I
was once his guest in his beautiful palace of
Beit-ed-Deen close to Deir-el-Kamr, the capital
of Lebanon. He lived there in all the pride of
high position. He boasted to me that the
marble columns of his elevated abode (they
were of pure white marble) were no longer in
danger from the thunderstorms by which in
former times they had frequently been shaken,
for he had introduced the lightning-conductors
which lie had seen attached to the mainmast of
a ship-of-war during a voyage he had made to
Egypt, and as the sight excited his curiosity and
interest, he determined also by iron rods to
convey safely to earth the menacing mischiefs
of the thunderclouds of heaven. In his presence,
and prepared by his own servants, I
smoked the most delicious chibouk which, in my
long experience, I was ever privileged to enjoy;
the pipes were not decorated as the pipes which
Turkish and Egyptian pashas are wont to use:
the bowls were of Stamboul clay, the tube of
the straight cherry-sticks of Asia Minor, the
mouthpiece of smooth solid amber, so pleasant
to the touch, and to which the lips so agreeably
accommodate themselves; but the tobacco was
so carefully piled, the lighted cinder so nicely
concealed in the centre, that the least puff filled
the mouth with volumes of aroma, and before
the pipe was exhausted another was brought in,
a brass saucer placed on the ground to support
the bowl, and the mouthpiece presented to the
guest by a kneeling attendant.

Among the graceful courtesies of the Emir
Bekir, known as the Prince of the Druses,
I remember that he sent his son, the Emin,
on our arrival at his palace, to inquire whether
we would be entertained in European
or Oriental style, and being curious to see
how far Western usages were understood
by our host, we replied that we should
prefer to be treated as Franks, and not according
to the customs of the country. Nothing
was wanting to our accommodation. Tables,
chairs, porcelain, glass, silver spoons and forks,
knives, and all the accompaniments of a handsomely
provided Christian repast were introduced,
and but for the costumes of the attendants,
and the furniture of the apartments, we
might have fancied we had for our host a well-
bred and opulent English country gentleman.
When our meal was finished, we were invited to
the presence of the prince, and, the pipes being
brought in, we heard from his lips particulars
of his eventful history, little dreaming then
that it was speedily to be terminated by disaster
and downfal. He became involved in the quarrels
between the Turkish Sultan and the Pasha
of Egypt, when Syria became the battle-field,
and died, an unhappy exile, at Constantinople.

Syrian ladies generally prefer the narghilé. A
leaf, called timbac, is used instead of tobacco,
to which it bears a very slight resemblance. The
instrument rests on the ground, the leaf being
kindled at the end of a tube; the smoke is
inhaled through a globe-like glass vessel, filled
with water, sometimes scented, the whole being
supported by a stand. Another tube, communicating
with the glass globe, is placed between
the lips. The narghilés form pretty domestic
ornaments.

At Hamath and Homs, very beautiful metallic
pipe-tubes, called serpents, are manufactured.
They have wonderful flexibility, and are much
appreciated in the East.

Mahomet Ali Pasha had an apartment full of
pipes, many of which were very gay and costly.
He usually smoked one whose amber mouth was
encircled by a ring of large diamonds, the staff
of cherry wood, with a broad-bottomed bowl of