Page:The Anatomy of Tobacco.pdf/18

 mind that conceived it; a young mind that would have been gay, but was cast into a dismal prison. A bad little book, indeed, but distinctly a queer little book for a lad of twenty to write as a relief for all his troubles.

And here is my point. We have been talking about the strange variety of things; and I am making this "Anatomy of Tobacco" an exhibit and an instance in the argument. Here is a lad of twenty alone in the London of 1883. He is earning his living by teaching small children at a wage of twenty-five shillings a week; and twenty-five shillings a week did not go far, even in the London of forty years ago. He lives in a small room, about ten foot by six in measurement, at the top of a house in a quiet street. His diet is dry bread, green tea and tobacco. He chooses this in preference to the meal of the cheap eating-house, because the eating-house is nasty, and he hates nastiness above all things. How is this unfortunate going to make such a life in any way endurable? He is exiled from his old