CIGARS FOR WOMEN.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 June 1923, Page 10

CIGARS FOR WOMEN.

CIGARETTES TOO LIGHT, HABIT ON THE INCREASE. Instead of the predicted decline, the habit of smoking among women is growing more and more general. It is estimated that the increased popularity of the cigarette has been conspicuously augmented to a high percentage by women smokers, and manufacturers are continually placing on the market new and dainty brands of the fascinating little cube, especially designed for feminine patrons (says the Sydney Daily Mail). Incidentally, three manufacturers of expensive variants on the “noxious” though seductive weed are piling up dividends as a result, and adding to their personal and commercial affluence. Women smokers in Sydney are increasing by the score. The girl who can display fingers unstained by nicotine is a rarity. Few women in these hectic days are guiltless of carrying about with them their silver cigarettecases and match-boxes. Time was when an occasional puff lent a certain air of smartness and gaiety to assemblages of the softer sex, end their cigarettes were chiefly supplied by male admirers, just for the novelty of the offering. Nowadays the youngest girls buy their own supplies unblushingly. The box of cigarettes is as necessary to her comfort as the pipe to the average man.

London firms are beginning to specialise in smoking outfits for women patrons. Some of the cigarette and cigar cabinets in their establishments have cost as much as £5OO each.

English women are renouncing the cigarette for the less mild cigar. The brands produced for their use so far, are smaller in make and of milder leaf than those intended for men.

But women are smoking seriously, and it is quite on the cards that before long they will ‘be Vieing with their husbands and brothers in the consumption of heavy leaf. Sydney women are not remarkable for their rehictahce in adopting new ideas, however bizarre and unbecoming. It will probab?/ not be long before the fashionable restaurants and hotellounges will witness the advent of the fragrant cigar between rouged lips. Already the pipe—a costly, jewelled affalir—has made its appearance among women in European cities. So far we have been -spared that invasion here, though some of the Sydney purveyors of smoking requisites have exhibited specimens in their showcases.