PIPES. The most widely used pipes are Meerschaum, Wood (such as Briar-root and Cherry) and Clay.
Meerschaum is a silicate of magnesia, obtained chiefly from alluvial deposits in Asia Minor. It is also occasionally found on the seashore, washed up by the waves, with the result that it has been poetically, but erroneously, called the "petrified foam of the sea." As mined, it is white and so soft as to be easily cut with an ordinary knife. Long and expensive manipulation is necessary to produce the hard Meerschaum of commerce, the finest quality of which is known as Spiegel Meerschaum, or "look ing glass" Meerschaum, because of its lustre when colored.
The coloring of Meerschaum pipes is the effect of the smoke, drawn through the pores of the Meerschaum, settling on the waxy surface which is produced by the boil ing in wax which forms one of the final processes of preparation.
Briar-root is the extremely hard wool-root of a variety of heath, grown chiefly in Southern France and Italy, "Briar" being a corruption of the French Bruyere. Good-sized specimens frequently have a circumference of two to three feet. Before export, the roots are cut into blocks and then boiled.
Amber, shaped into mouth-pieces for the more expensive pipes and cigar-holders, is a fossilized vegetable resin found in biturriinous beds along the Baltic Sea. In addi tion to this use, it is employed in the manufacture of beads, earrings, etc.
Clay Pipes are made from a fine white, or red, clay, known to commerce as "pipe clay." The pipe is first fashioned "solid," consisting then of a slender stick with a lump on the end for the bowl. When this has slightly hardened, the stem is pierced with an oiled steel wire and the bowl is formed with a brass mold. Next comes "shap ing up" with a knife, further drying, baking in a kiln and polishing.
The finest clay pipes are imported from France. They are generally soft and rather creamy in appearance, and easily absorb nicotine. They are made in all man ner of fanciful designs, large bowls embellished with heads of public characters being in special demand.
French, and German, manufacturers also turn out a great variety of pipes of red and other colored clays. Gambier bowls, of French clay and handsomely decorated in colors, meet with a steady sale among a certain line of customers.
Dutch clays are usually distinguished from other types by smaller bowls and long, slim stems.
The Scottish "cutty-pipe" and Irish "d adeeu" are short clay pipes.
The trade in the Porcelain bowl pipes, popular in Holland and Germany, is very limited in this country, and is confined almost solely to the children of "der Vader land." Americans object to them on the ground that they are not sufficiently porous and easily become heated in smoking.
The numerous other kinds made include several styles with an outer covering of cork; those of "Congo Wood," nearly black in color; others fashioned from gourds, etc. There is also a large sale in many parts of corn-cob pipes, the bowls consisting of sections of the corn-cob from which the inner pith has been removed.
A primitive pipe, still in use in some rural districts of England and the Continent, consists of a stick of elder from which the pith has been removed, with a bowl formed of common clay dried by the kitchen fire. Aubrey, 1680, says that gentlemen smokers in England at first used silver pipes, "but the ordinary sort made use of a walnut-shell and a straw."