Women Who Smoke Too Much.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXVII, Issue 24, 15 December 1906, Page 18

Women Who Smoke Too Much.

Englishwomen of the upper class are being told by their doctor that they are smoking too much, and beginning seriously to damage their health in many cases. They aim at soothing

their nerves, but instead of being cont nt with half a dozen cigarettes a day they are smoking two or three times as many, and producing the opposite effect. Excessive indulgence leads to frequent indigestion, and then in turn to inadequate nourishment, nerve weakness and irritability. The doctors are told that they exaggerate, and do not make sufficient allowance for other conditions which produce nerve weakness, especially among women who spend most of their lives in town. It is at any rate a fact that the number of those, who smoke is rapidly increasing, and as women are generally more liable to suffer physically from the habit than men, the chances arc that the doctors •are not far wrong. In one large West End restaurant for middle class customers on? ean see any evening groups of professional women smoking cigarette after cigarette with their after dinner coffee. Apropos of this feminine indulgence in tobacco in England, a report from Paris is interesting. A leading tobacconist there, proceeded against on the ground that he did not possess a certificate justifying him in calling himself “purveyor of cigarettes to Qu?en Margherita of Italy.” has proved that he regularly supplies her Majesty with cigarettes. The same dealer states that among other royalties addicted to smoking arc the Empress of Russia, the Queen of Romnania (who has a pronounced fondness for it). Queen Maria Christina of Spain and Queen Amelie of Portugal.