A short anecdote about P. G. Wodehouse and the Anti-Tobacco League circulated between 1920 and 1921 among local American newspapers. This is the text as published in the Chico Record (California) on September 9, 1920:
THE MODERN WIFE
P. G. Wodehouse, the novelist and wit, was talking about the Anti-Tobacco League.
"They have taken our wine away from us," he said, "and they threaten to take away our tobacco. The modern woman, however, will balk them there.
"An anti-tobacco friend talked so eloquently at the house of a friend of mine the other day that a young municipal reformer rose and said solemnly:
"'My wife gave me a box of a hundred magnificent Egyptian cigarettes last night. I smoked one of them, but I now see so clearly the evils of cigarette smoking that I am going to go straight home and throw the rest in the fire.'
"The reformer's young wife then rose in her turn.
"'I'll go home with him,' she said, and she added, smiling brightly on the assembled guests:
"'My intention is to rescue the ninety and nine.'"
A very similar version appeared in the Arizona Republican on January 10, 1921, with minor changes including "beer" for "wine" and "block" for "balk". Probably there were others.
I have no idea where this originated, or whether the anecdote is genuine. For what it's worth, I haven't found it anywhere else without Wodehouse's name attached.
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