From Chapter 9: A few years earlier, in November 1825, Scott had written in his "Journal" that after dinner he usually smoked a couple of cigars which operated as a sedative—:
Just to drive the cold winter away,
And drown the fatigues of the day.
"I smoked a good deal," he continued, "about twenty years ago when at Ashestiel; but, coming down one morning to the parlour, I found, as the room was small and confined, that the smell was unpleasant, and laid aside the use of the
Nicotian weed for many years; but was again led to use it by the example of my son, a hussar officer, and my son-in-law, an Oxford student. I could lay it aside to-morrow; I laugh at the dominion of custom in this and many things.
We make the giants first, and then do not
kill them."
Scott's remark that Lockhart smoked when an Oxford student rather discredits Archdeacon's Denison's statement, quoted in the preceding chapter, that
smoking was very generally unknown in Oxford in 1823-24. The archdeacon was writing from memory—a very untrustworthy recorder; Scott's remark was that of a contemporary.
From Chapter 1: Who first smoked a pipe
of tobacco in England? The honour is divided among several claimants. It has often been stated that Captain William Middleton or Myddelton (son of Richard Middleton, Governor of Denbigh Castle), a Captain Price and a Captain Koet were the first who smoked publicly in London, and that folk flocked from all parts to see them; and it is usually added that pipes were not then invented, so they smoked the twisted leaf, or cigars. This account first appeared in one of the volumes of Pennant's "Tour in Wales." But the late Professor Arber long ago pointed out that the remark as to the mode of
smoking by cigars and not by pipes was simply Pennant's speculation. The authority for the rest of the story is a paper in the Sebright MSS., which, in an account of William Middleton, has the remark: "It is sayed, that he, with Captain Thomas Price of Plâsyollin and one Captain Koet, were the first who smoked, or (as they called it) drank tobacco publickly in London; and that the Londoners flocked from all parts to see them." No date is named, and no further particulars are available.
