Darrell Winfield, one of the last of the Marlboro Men, has died.

Eric Lawson, who played the rugged Marlboro Man in cigarette ads in the late 1970s, has died in California. He was 72.

On top of the hill the old man and his wife were standing next to the altar they had made, muttering words into the smoke.

GIVEN the day that was in it, early risers could have been forgiven for thinking the sacking of the main opposition party’s justice spokesman for breaking the new smoking law was an April Fool’s Day joke.