The Tobacco Tiller

Sir of the silken robe and waving plume, -dizzy with visions of the wealth of the Montezumas to be conquered, -you who in the beginning of the sixteenth century, presented the Indian weed to your Sovereign at Madrid, -Fernando Cortez-answer to your name! Sir Frances Drake, the first son of Old England to look to the borders of the Peaceful Ocean, -bring forward Ralph Lane, starving pearl-hunter of Roanoke Island, whom you rescued. Answer, Lane, you who introduced the Indian custom of "drinking tobacco" into your country! Noble prisoner of the Tower, -chivalrous subject of Her Sovereign Majesty, Elizabeth, in whose honor was named the sunny land which grew the herb of enchantment, -you who made the herb fashionable in Britain, -Sir Walter Raleigh, answer to rol