PEDIATRICS Vol. 39 No. 2 February 1967, pp. 175
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THE INCIDENCE OF CIGARETTE SMOKING BY BOYS IN ENGLAND MORE THAN 60 YEARS AGO

T. E. C. JR. M.D.

In the first volume of The British journal of Children's Diseases published in 1904 the following editorial comments were made about cigarette smoking by boys:

CIGARETTE SMOKING BY BOYS—This subject has continued to be a topic in some of the daily papers. According to one of them, a schoolmaster who has a class of seventy-one boys between the ages of eight and thirteen asked those who smoked to stand on the forms. Sixty-seven stood up, and the four who remained seated "were looked at with suspicion." This seems to us rather a large percentage, and if the four who remained seated were justly "looked at with suspicion," we can hardly help thinking that some who stood on the forms feared ironical jeers from their schoolmates if they classed themselves with the "behind-the-times" non-smokers more than they did a lecture from the schoolmaster if they associated themselves with the smokers. There can be little doubt that it is not the pleasure of smoking, but the idea that it is grand or manly that leads the majority of boys who smoke to indulge in the practice. Even with many adults it is not the flavour of the tobacco or any soothing effect upon the mind that is the explanation of their use of the pipe or the cigarette. It is one means of affording relief to a nervous craving a man may have when he is idle for something to do, if it is only for something to handle with his. fingers. A cigarette to a man is what knitting-pins. are to many women.

Save for the quaint comment about knitting-pins taking the place of a cigarette for women, could not this same editorial be written today? Once again plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose!