These come from PKD books. I’ve read a lot of snuff references in his stuff. from: Cadbury, The Beaver That Lacked. “The next day at work, alone with the half-gnawed poplar tree, he produced a small note-pad and short pencil, envelope and stamp which he had managed to smuggle out of the house without Hilda noticing. Seated on a slight rise of earth, snuffing meditatively small pinches of Bezoar Fine Grind, he wrote a short note, printed so as to be easily read. TO WHOMEVER READS THIS! My name is Bob Cadbury and I am a young, fairly healthy beaver with a broad background in political science and theology, although largely self-taught, and I would like to talk with you about God and The Purpose of Existence and other topics of like ilk. Or we could play chess. Cordially, And he thereupon signed his name. For a time he pondered, sniffed an extra large pinch of Bezoar Fine Grind, and then he added: P.S. Are you a girl? If you are I’ll bet you’re pretty. “ and from Ubik: “I stopped, rubbed my hands together for warmth in the cold Alpine air, and squinted into the Swiss sun. I took a small container of Prince Albert snuff from my jacket pocket. “Do you have Prince Albert in a can?” we used to joke as children, when anybody remembered what a can was. This can had cost me 95 poscreds on the black market, and I was sure it wasn’t really Prince Albert. They had stopped making it years ago. I took a pinch of the high-grade snuff, replaced the container, and walked into the Beloved Brethren Moratorium.”
@Xander correct on Dean Swift. It used to be one of the only snuffs available in the Bay Area. The old line had a Dr. Johnson’s (peppermint), Mrs. Siddon’s Own, Bezoar Fine Grind, Inchkenneth, Cameleopard, and a few others I can’t recall. I visited with Wade Poole several times when I lived in the city and in Mill Valley. Great old guy and a true “toffee nose”. His hair and moustache were gray…except around his nose 
At that time he bought the snuff in bulk from Illingworth and packaged it in SF. It came in twist tap tins, 1/2 oz flip top hinged tins, 1 oz tubes and he even had some in cloth bags a la Bull Durham. His little place was in the hinterlands out near the wharf. I’m not sure when he switched to Wilsons, most likely when Illingworth burned down in the eighties. Dean Swift’s tag line was JOIN THE RUSH. He retired and sold the business to a woman in Santa Maria and the whole thing promptly went to hell. Drucquer & Sons in Berkeley sold some old stock for several years and also sold Dr. Rumney’s, Dunhill Snuff and a few others. Greg Pease worked there at the time, but didn’t know much about snuff other than the price http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/documentStore/j/e/a/jea00c00/Sjea00c00.pdf http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1346&dat=19800707&id=4fEvAAAAIBAJ&sjid=H\_sDAAAAIBAJ&pg=2613,2095862
every crowd scene in a book that I read has someone taking snuff if you look in the corner.
My wife likes to read historical romance novels–basically stories of romance in historically accurate settings. She says that many of the characters take snuff. I think it makes her more kindly disposed to my use of snuff.
Thanks for the articles @chefdaniel I’ll post them in the Library.
@xander, I remember the “cokesnuff” from the late 1960s being in head shops in Laguna Beach, CA. If I recall, I bought strawberry scented snuff, and it was tobacco for sure. They also carried Dean Swift, and as Chef Daniel mentioned, I remember the logo “join the rush”.
Didn’t Hercule Poirot use snuff in at least a couple of Agatha Christie’s _ early _ novels? In _ Cards on the Table _, we find Hercule interested in a snuffbox display. I think that in a couple of the Poirot stories (before his excentricities became set in stone) he partook. After his character became fully developed, a speck of snuff anywhere upon Poirot’s immaculate self would be unthinkable!
I’m fairly sure that in G.K. Chesterton’s _ Father Brown _ series, Father Brown’s assistant: reformed criminal M. Hercule Flambeau was a snuff sniffer.
As a kid, I remember a series of books, the Professor Brainstorm series, about a mad old half-baked inventor. He was always taking snuff. The books are probably banned now bbecause of their possible detrimental effect on children.
Victor Hugo, Les Misérables, Inspector Javert. “The snuffbox lies full and untouched in the pocket of Javert’s greatcoat for nearly three months. There are days he almost forgets it is there – and then he will walk past a tobacconist, or turn a corner too quickly so that it raps against his thigh, or out of the corner of his eye see the familiar flash of silver in another man’s hand and find his own too empty.”
I am reading “The Memoirs of Casanova” and there Snuff is mentioned a couple of times so far, this time some “Negrillo tobacco from Habana”… these mentions are often accompanied by the descriptions about the features of the snuff boxes.
Found another one! Unce Abner Master of Mysteries by: Melville Davisson Post pub.: 1910 In: “An Act of God” “Randolph stopped beside him as he went out, took a pinch of snuff, and trumpeted in his big, many colored handkerchief.” Squire Randolph was the local judge/magistrate in the Uncle Abner stories. These take place somewhere around western Virginia, sometime between the end of the Civil War and 1900.
This is from one of my favorite books I read as a child, Pippi Longstocking. “She dug the empty bottle out of the sack. She also managed to find some paper and a pencil. Putting these on a stone in front of Tommy, she said, ‘You know more about the art of writing than I do.’ ‘But what shall I write?’ asked Tommy. ‘Let me think a moment.’ Pippi pondered. 'You can write this: “Help us before we perish-- we have been on this island for two days without snuff.” ‘Oh, but Pippi, we can’t write that!’ said Tommy reproachfully. ‘It isn’t true.’ ‘What isn’t true?’ ‘We can’t write “without snuff,”’ said Tommy. ‘Oh, we can’t?’ said Pippi. ‘Have you any snuff?’ ‘No,’ said Tommy. … ‘But we don’t use snuff. … If we write that people will think we use snuff,’ insisted Tommy. ‘Now look here, Tommy,’ said Pippi, ‘will you just answer this. Which people are more often without snuff-- the ones who use it or the ones who don’t?’ ‘The ones who don’t, of course,’ said Tommy. ‘Well, what are you fussing about, then?’ said Pippi. ‘Write it as I tell you.’ So Tommy wrote: ‘Help us before we perish-- we have been on this island for two days without snuff.’ Pippi took the paper, stuffed it into the bottle, put the stopper in, and threw the bottle into the water. ‘Now we should soon be rescued,’ she said.”
“A Pinch of Snuff” by Eric Taylor I am currently on a pulp fiction kick and this one was published in the June 1929 issue of Black Mask. Black Mask was a pulp fiction magazine published between 1920 and 1951. It specialized in hard-boiled detective stories.
Charles Dickens’ Pickwick Papers features a snuff sniffer…If I remember correctly it was Mr. Pickwick’s attorney
This is from one of my favorite books I read as a child, Pippi Longstocking. Let me think a moment.’ Pippi pondered. 'You can write this: “Help us before we perish-- we have been on this island for two days without snuff.”
Actually, in the original Swedish version they speak not of snuff, but of snus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEBjWYaxLRg <– There’s the movie version of the dialogue, aptly named “Utan snus” (“Without snus”). Guess Lindgren’s books found an international audience before General and Ettan did ^^
Snuff is mentioned often in AC Doyles Sherlock Holmes. But so is lots of tobacco
In the opening lines of Tom Sharpe’s ‘the Great Pursuit’ the cunning literary agent Frensic is described thus: ‘When anyone asked Frensic why he took snuff he replied that it was because by rights he should have lived in the 18th century.’ The character continues to snuff his way throughout the novel, apparently favouring beareu.