Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 93, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 April 1910 — TOBACCO AND MISSIONARIES. [ARTICLE]

TOBACCO AND MISSIONARIES.

A Once Popular gamoriat’c Ideas on an Important Subject. I am glad to notice a strong effort on the part of the friends of humanity to encourage those who wish to quit the use of tobacco. To quit the use of this weed is one of the most agreeable methods of relaxation. I have tried it a great many times, and 1 can safely say that it has afforded me much solid felicity. • To violently reform and-cast away the weed, and at the end of a week to fimL-a good cigar unexpectedly in the quiet, unostentatious pocket of an old vest, affor4s the most intense and delirious delight. Scientists tell us that a single drop of the concentrated oil of tobacco on the tongue of an adult dog is fatal. I have no doubt about the truth or cohesive power of this statement, and for that reason I have always been opposed to the use of tobacco among dogs. Dogs should shun the concentrated oil of tobacco, especially if longevity be any object to them. Neither would I advise a man who has canine tendencies or a strain of that blood in his veins to use the concentrated oil of tobacco as a sozodont. To those who may feel that way about tobacco I would say, shun It by all means. Shun it as you would the deadly Upas tree or the still more deadly whipple-tree of the tropics: Scientists who have been unable to successfully use tobacco, and who therefore have given their whole lives and the use of their mlcroscopejs to the investigation of its horrors, say that cannibals will not eat the flesh of tobacco-using human beings. And yet we say to our missionaries: *“No man can be a Christian and use tobacco.” I say, and I say it, too, with all that depth of feeling which has always characterized my earnest nature, that in this we are committing a great error. What have the cannibals ever done for us as a people that we should avoid the use of tobacco in to fit our flesh for their tables? In What way have they sought to ameliorate our condition in life that we should strive in death to tickle their palates? Look at the history of the cannibal for past ages. Read carefully his record, and you will see that it has been but the history of a selfish race. Cast your eye back over your shoulder for a century, and what do yqu find to be the condition of the cannlbalists? A new missionary has landed a few weeks previously perhaps. A little group is gathered about on the beach beneath a tropical tree. Representative cennih&ls from adjoining islands are present. The odor of sanctity pervades the air. Tkeedhjef sfts beneath a new umbrella, looktns at the pictures in a large concordance. yA new plug hat la hanging m a tree near by. Anon the leading citizens gather about on the ground and we hear the chief ask his attorney general whether he will take some of the light ox some of the 4*ipk meat. r away in England a paper contains the following personal: Wanted—A young man to go as missionary to supply a vacancy In. one of the Cannibal Islands He must fully understand the appetites and tastes ot the cannibals, must be able to reach their Inner natures at once, and must not use tobacco. Applicants may communicate in person or by letter. Is it strknge that under these circumstances .those, who frequented the Cannibal islands during the last cen-

tury should have quietly accustomed themselves to the use of a peculiarly pernicious, vioftn* and all-pervading brand of tobacco? I think not. To me the statement that tobaccotainted human flesh is offensive to the cannibals does not come home with crushing power. Perhaps I do not love my fellowman so well as the cannibal does. I know that I am selfish in this way, and If My-cannibal brother desires to polish my wishbone ha must take me as he finds me. I cannot abstain wholly from the use of tobacco In order td gratify the pampered tastes of one who has never gone out of his way to do me a favor. *>o I ask the cannibal to break off the pernicipus use of tobacco because I dislike the flavor of It in his brisket? I will defy any respectable Resident of the Cannibal islands to-day to place his finger on a solitary instance where I have ever, by word or deed, Intimated that he should make the slightest change in his habits on my account, unless it be that 1 may have suggested that a diet consisting of more anarchists and less human beings would be more productive of general and lasting good. My own Idea would be to send a class of men to these islands so thoroughly imbued with their great object and the oil of tobacco that the great Caucasian chowder of those regions would be followed by such weeping and walling, and gnashing of teeth, and such remorse, and repentance, and gastric upheavals that it would be as unsafe to eat a missionary in the Cannibal islands as ft Is to eat ice cream in the United States to-day.—Frim Bill Nye'S Budget.