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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. i. JUNE 10, 1916.

BRITISH HERB : HERB TOBACCO (12 S. i. 48, 136, 317, 432). In 'A Dictionary of Terms Used in Medicine and the Collateral Sciences,' by Richard D. Hoblyn, 1835, p. 210, under ' Quack Medicines ' is :

"British Herb Tobacco. The basis of this is Coltsfoot. This appears to have had a very ancient origin, for the same plant was smoked through a reed in the days of Dioscorides, for the purpose of promoting expectoration, and was called by him fiift iov O'c=/37fa;ioi'], from r?, tussis, whence '* Tussilago.' "

The quack medicines given by Hoblyn are, as he says, " some of the most important of these preparations, taken from the ' Phar- macologia ' of Dr. Paris."

Perhaps this " British Herb Tobacco " was the preparation patented by the Rev. John Jones (last reference). One can scarcely think it possible that the members of the Amicable Club of Warrington (ante, p. 48) would smoke a medicine, and that costing nearly twice as much as tobacco.

Is there not a reference to some kind of British Herb Tobacco in the following lines ?

Who Knaster loves not, be he doomed to feed With Caffres foul, or suck Virginia's weed. At morn I love segars, at noon admire The British compound, pearly from the fire.

They occur in a poem by Dr. John Ferriar, which is at or near the end of his ' Illustra- tions of Sterne,' &c., 1768, a poem " written to rally a particular friend on his attachment to German Tobacco and German literature." I am not quoting direct from Ferriar, but at second hand from ' Cheshire Gleanings,' by William E. A. Axon, Manchester and London, 1884, pp. 282-5. I suppose that

The British compound, pearly from the fire,

means " The British compound (whatever it was) which had been burnt to a white ash in the pipe."

Such habit as there may have been of smoking a medicinal preparation of colts- foot, &c., may account to some extent for the prevalence of spittoons in smoking-rooms lip to some years ago utensils now passing into oblivion. ROBERT PIERPOINT.

In the several communications upon herb tobacco I do not observe any allusion to the fact of its contemporary use. Herb tobacco is still to be bought of the herbalists. The shop of Mr. Lowry at 445 York Road (nearly opposite the end of Wandsworth Bridge) is a case in point. Since discovering this, I have used herb tobacco, in a mixture with

returns," &c., and have found it welcome

enough. It has the soothing influence which your smoker desires above all things, while the reduced quantity of nicotine inhaled accounts for a diminution of that lassitude from which many smokers suffer.

EDWARD SMITH. Wandsworth, S.W.

" LAUS DEO " : OLD MERCHANTS' CUSTOM (12 S. i. 409). In the ledger of Sir William Turner, president of the Associated Hospitals, each page is headed with this pious ascrip- tion. Vide ' The Story of Bethlehem- Hospital,' p. 215. ALECK ABRAHAMS.

It would be interesting to know whether the alleged custom really existed. The explanation I have heard given was that these reverent old merchants headed each folio of their ledgers with the letters L. S. D., which did not mean " Laus Semper Deo," but pounds, shillings, and pence.

GEO. W. G. BARNARD.

Norwich.

I do not remember seeing the words " Laus Deo " written at the beginning of a ledger, but some years ago, when we were destroying a number of old account-books belonging to our firm, I noticed that many of them had written on the first folio the letters :

I. G. I.

M. T.

I asked my father what these letters meant, and he told me that they stood for " In God Is My Trust."

BENJ. WALKER.

Langstone, Erdiriscton.

VILLAGE POUNDS (12 S. i. 29, 79, 117, 193, 275, 416). As these references comprise village pounds no longer in use, or even in existence, may I be allowed to mention one that formerly existed in the village of Symondsbury, near Bridport, in Dorset ?

I remember once, when a small boy, seeing a donkey impounded in it ; and on passing by again in a few days I found the donkey lying dead on the ground, evidently having succumbed from starvation, as the

t round a small square on one side of a eld next the road was quite bare. The owner had not redeemed it, and the villagers were probably restrained by an exaggerated fear of the law from venturing to throw in any grass or hay. Surely the local hayward must have failed in his duty ! I fancy the law would now compel the impounder to feed the animal, or empower him to sell it if not reclaimed within a certain time.