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Show LONG FIOHT ON TOBACCO VAIN English King and the Church Unable to Stop Growing of the Weed.'' Tobacco raising in England has a varied and checkered history. First Introduced there in 1CC3, tho Elizabethan Eliza-bethan courtiers soon cultivated a liking lik-ing for It. Ere long tho common people peo-ple followed their oxamplc, nnd smoking became a universal habit among tho English. They began to Import, large quantities of tho Virginian Vir-ginian weed and soon after learned to grow it for themselves. When tho British agriculturists had mastered tho art-of raising tobneco at homo and conquered tho climatic difficulties at first encountered In producing It, the practice of smoking was denounced In court. Jamec I issued a counterblast to tho weed. Charles I was no loss opposed op-posed to It. He also adopted strong measures to discourage Its uso and prevent its cultivation. Tho church likewise, took up arms against smoking. smok-ing. In splto of tho royal edicts against tobacco It continued to bo grown surreptitiously to a largo extent. ex-tent. Charles II Imposed such a heavy duty on tho native article as, It was thought, would havo tho effect of excluding ex-cluding It from llrltlsli crops. Tho Increased tax, howovor, did not pro-vent pro-vent largo numbers from being Independent Inde-pendent of foreign countries for their supply of this commodity. In those days It was not as easy for tho officials offi-cials to mako a long tour ot Inspection as it is now. Eventually, In 1782, a law was passed making It illegal to grow tobacco in arty quantity In England. Eng-land. Tho samo law, of course, applied ap-plied to Scotland and Ireland. In the latter country tobacco has traditions characteristically Its own. |
