From Chapter 1:
Every one knows the legend of the water (or beer) thrown over Sir Walter by his servant when he first saw his master smoking, and imagined he was on fire. The story was first associated with Raleigh by a writer in 1708 in a magazine called the British Apollo. According to this yarn Sir Walter usually "indulged himself in Smoaking secretly, two pipes a Day; at which time, he order'd a Simple Fellow, who waited, to bring him up a Tankard of old Ale and Nutmeg, always laying aside the Pipe, when he heard his servant coming." On this particular occasion, however, the pipe was not laid aside in time, and the "Simple Fellow," imagining his master was on fire, as he saw the smoke issuing from his mouth, promptly put the fire out by sousing him with the contents of the tankard. One difficulty about this story is the alleged secrecy of Raleigh's indulgence in tobacco. There seems to be no imaginable reason why he should not have smoked openly. Later versions turn the ale into water and otherwise vary the story.

From Chapter 8:
In the whole sixteen volumes of Walpole's correspondence, as so admirably edited by Mrs. Toynbee, there is scarcely a mention of tobacco; and the same may be said of other collections of letters of the same period—the Selwyn letters, the Delany correspondence, and so on. Neither Walpole nor any member of the world in which he lived would appear to have smoked. In Miss Burney's "Evelina," 1778, from the beginning to the end of the book there is no mention whatever of tobacco or of smoking. Apparently the vulgar Branghtons were not vulgar enough to smoke. Such use of tobacco was considered low, and was confined to the classes of society indicated in the preceding chapter. One of the characters in Macklin's "Love à la Mode," 1760, is described as "dull, dull as an alderman, after six pounds of turtle, four bottles of port, and twelve pipes of tobacco."