Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 153, September 12, 1917

Excerpt

THE SUPER-PIPE.

When Jackson first joined the jolly old B.E.F. he smoked a pipe. He carried it anyhow. Loose in his pocket, mind you. A pipe-bowl at his pocket's brim a simple pipe-bowl was to him, and it was nothing more. Of course no decent B.E.F. mess could stand that. Jackson was told that a pipe was anathema maranatha, which is Greek for no bon.

"What will I smoke then?" said Jackson, who was no Englishman. We waited for the Intelligence Officer to reply. We knew him. The Intelligence Officer said nothing. He drew something from his pocket. It was a parcel wrapped in cloth-of-gold. He removed the cloth-of-gold and there was discovered a casket, which he unlocked with a key attached to his identity disc. Inside the casket was a padlocked box, which he opened with a key attached by gold wire to his advance pay-book. Inside the box was a roll of silk. To cut it all short, he unwound puttee after puttee of careful wrapping till he reached a chamois-leather chrysalis, which he handled with extreme reverence, and from this he drew something with gentle fingers, and set it on the table-cloth before the goggle-eyed Jackson.

"A pipe," said Jackson.

There was a shriek of horror. The Intelligence Officer fainted. Here was wanton sacrilege.

"Man," said the iron-nerved Bombing Officer, "it's a Brownhill."

"What's a Brownhill?" asked Jackson.

We gasped. How could we begin to tell him of that West End shrine from which issue these lacquered symbols of a New Religion?

The Intelligence Officer was reviving. We looked to him.

"The prophet Brownhill," he said, "was once a tobacconist—an ordinary tobacconist who sold pipes."

We shuddered.

"He discovered one day that man wants more than mere pipes. He wants a—a super-pipe, something to reverence and—er—look after, you know, as well as to smoke. So he invented the Brownhill. It is an affaire de coeur—an affair of art," translated the I.O. proudly. "It is as glossy as a chestnut in its native setting, and you can buy furniture polish from the prophet Brownhill which will keep it always so. It has its year, like a famous vintage, it has a silver wind-pipe, and it costs anything up to fifty guineas."

"D'you smoke it'?" asked Jackson, brutally.

We gave him up. In awful silence each of us produced his wrappings and his caskets, extracted the shining briar, smeared it with cosmetics, and polished it more reverently than a peace time Guardsman polishes his buttons when warned for duty next day at "Buck."

And Jackson smoked his pipe in secret. He would take no leaf from the book of the Sassenachs.

And the War went on.

Jackson went on leave. To his deep disgust he had to wait a few hours in London on his way to more civilised parts, and fate led him idling to Brownhill's. He flattened his Celtic nose on the window and stared fascinated at the array of super-pipes displayed there. After a furtive glance along the street he crept into the temple. A white-coated priest met him. </>

"I—I'm wantin'—a—a pipe," said Jackson....