MEERSCHAUM PIPES. Whether smo king be a good or an evil practice, it leads at the present day to a wide system of commer cial enterprise. The meerschaum pipe is one among many manufactures connected with it. Meerschaum means in German sea foam; and Oho equivalent French name of hcume de mer is applied to the same substance. It is a silicated magnesian mineral, found in Greece, Turkey, and a few other countries. It is used by the Tartars for washing linen, somewhat in the same manner as pearl ash or fullers' earth. The mineral is principally used however as a material for tobacco pipes, which, when made, are soaked in melted tallow, then in white wax, and finally polished with shave-grass. If genuine, a meerschaum pipe acquires a beau tiful brown colour after being smoked for some time, the oil of the tobacco being absorbed by the clay ; and this is a point to which connoisseurs in smoking attach much importance.
Dr. E. D. Clarke gives some interesting details on this subject. In the Crimea the meerschaum clay is called keff-kil, and forms a stratum about two feet thick, beneath a much thicker stratum of marl. The first rude form is given to the pipes upon the spot where the mineral is found; here they are pressed within a mould, and laid in the sun to harden; afterwards they are baked in an oven, boiled in milk, and rubbed with soft leather.
In this state they go to Constantinople, where there is a peculiar bazaar or khan for the sale of them ; they are then bought up by mer chants, and sent by caravans to Pesth in Hungary. Still the form of the pipe is large and rude. At Pesth a manufacturer begins to fit them for the German markets. They are there soaked for twenty-four hours in water, and then turned in a lathe. In this process many of them, proving porous, are rejected. Sometimes only two or three out of ten are deemed worthy of further labour. From Pesth they are conveyed to Vienna, and frequently mounted in silver. After this they are carried to the fairs of Leipsic, Frankfort, Mannheim, and other towns upon the Rhine, where the best, sell from three to five and even seven pounds sterling. When the oil of tobacco, after long smoking, has given them a fine por celain yellow, or which is more prized, a dark tortoise-shell hue, they have been known to sell for forty or fifty pounds of our money.' Dr. Clarke's description refers to a period many years back ; but it will serve to illustrate the Subject.