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Show CONT ALL SMOKE HAVANAS. Th Xutnbrr of Poopl In This Couotr? Who Miiolio Imported Clear. "As near as we can get at it." said the. cigar dealer, "we calculate that thero are 13,000.000 smokers iu the United States. We haven't been.uble to trot it down Hue enough jet to estimate how many of these smoko cigars, what portion tho pipe, or tho number of those who inhale the delusive delu-sive cigarette, but we can pet protty close to the number who go in for im-ported im-ported cigars. And that number sur. prised me when I figured it out. Not one person in u thousaud would be able to guess anywhere near it, after knowing know-ing tho total number of smokers in the country. Now. out of those 13,-000,000 13,-000,000 smokers how many indulge iu Havana??" About 4,000,000," replied the reporter. re-porter. That's the nearest to the number of any guess I've had. and I have a standing stand-ing oiler of a box of the best Ferfectos to tho man w ho guesses within half a million of the nctual tigttres. I'm sorry, sor-ry, but near as you came you have uot won the box. You're out of the way, though, only about 4,000,000 in jour guess. Now then, if you'll tell mo whether you are too hipli or too low I'll give you the Ferfectos." "Too low, of course." "Exactly. That's what they all think. Fin sorry, young man, but you dou't get the box. "You're just 8,934,-000 8,934,-000 smokers too high in your estimate. Hardly believe it, would you? Nobody would. Hut it's so, and there's no getting get-ting around it. Why if there wero 4,-000,000 4,-000,000 consumers of Havana cigars in this country, how often do you suppose sup-pose each one would get a Havana to smoke? Just about three a month. That is, if all tho cigars imported from Cuba into tho Uuitcd States were equally divided among 4,000.000 smokers, smok-ers, each smoker would havo twenty-tive twenty-tive cigars and a piece of one. At the outsidu. we take from Cuba 110,000,000 cigars a year. This is all tho demand calls for. Consequently, we smoke in round numbers 3:10,000 of them every day. "I think it is fair to give five cigars as each smoker's daily average. So we see by easy figuring that just GG,-000 GG,-000 persons are all that are required to get away with all the imported cigars that the United Stales consumes annually. annu-ally. Astonishing', isn't itP Out of nil army of 13,000,000 people iu this country coun-try who smoke, only CG.000 indulge in the luxury of imported cigars, but that 66.000 pay not'less thau an aver-age aver-age of l apieco every day for tho privilege, which makes the snug little sum of $22,000,000 a year whioli goes tip in the fragrant smoke of the Havana in this great aud glorious laud." Chicago Journal. |