So each to his business, and his handbook to each--How to Write
for the Press to the special representative, and How to Be an
Author to the author. There is no book, I believe, called How to
Be a Solicitor, or a doctor or an admiral or a brewer. That is a
different matter altogether; but any fool can write for the
papers.
Smoking as a Fine Art
My first introduction to Lady Nicotine was at the innocent age of
eight, when, finding a small piece of somebody else's tobacco
lying unclaimed on the ground, I decided to experiment with it.
Numerous desert island stories had told me that the pangs of
hunger could be allayed by chewing tobacco; it was thus that the
hero staved off death before discovering the bread-fruit tree.
Every right-minded boy of eight hopes to be shipwrecked one day,
and it was proper that I should find out for myself whether my
authorities could be trusted in this matter. So I chewed tobacco.
In the sense that I certainly did not desire food for some time
afterwards, my experience justified the authorities, but I felt
at the time that it was not so much for staving off death as for
reconciling oneself to it that tobacco-chewing was to be
recommended. I have never practised it since.
At eighteen I went to Cambridge, and bought two pipes in a case.
In those days Greek was compulsory, but not more so than two
pipes in a case.
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