The Portuguese took it as an article of commerce to China, but up to 1767 the average landed was 200 chests. After 1767 it suddenly increased to 1000 chests, and the English East India Com pany in 1773 made their first venture. They repeated it in 1776 ; and the drug, which cost in Calcutta Es. 500 the chest, was sold in China for 500 dollars. In 1794, Indian opium was imported to the extent of 1500 chests.
At this time the Chinese Government began their efforts of repression. In 1796, it was declared a crime to smoke opium. Up till 1842, it was contraband. British adventurers continued to dis regard the Chinese prohibition, and in the year 1839 the Chinese authorities seized and' estroyed 20,000 chests of opium, the property of British subjects then in Chinese waters. This led to war between Great Britain and China, and the Chinese paid an indemnity for the opium destroyed, and paid also several millions sterling as compensation for the expenses of the war. In 1842, the treaty of Nankin released the trade. In 1844, however, the emperor was still objecting to the national weakness for opium being made a source of revenue. He said, It is true that I cannot pre vent the introduction of the flowing poison,— gainseeking and corrupt men will, for profit and sensuality, defeat my wishes ; but nothing will induce me to derive a revenue from the vice and misery of my people.' In 1800, the emperor Hea King issued a proclamation forbidding its importation, and prohibiting its cultivation in Yunnan. Nevertheless, in 1827 the foreign imports had increased to nearly 10,000 chests per annum ; ten years later to 40,000 chests ; in 1856-57 the import was 70,000 ; and in 1881 it was 90,000. From this rapid increase it is but fair to con jecture that the use of the drug was, previous to the 18th century, limited in China to medical pur poses, and that,• however long it may have been cultivated in the Chinese province of Yunnan, its use as a luxury was limited, and even in that pro vince the cultivation must have been small. On the coast, however, Dampier states that the use of opium in his time was great and widely extended, and could not therefore have been recently ac quired. He states that in 1688 he took in at Acheen from 300 to 400 pounds of opium to trade with at Malacca, where he disposed of it privately, as it was prohibited. From Malacca, he says, ships were accustomed to take it to the different Malay states, and exchange it for pepper and other articles of produce.
After the treaties of Tien-tsing and Pekin, opium was declared a legal import at the duty of 30 taels per pikul, i.e. about £10 per chest, and transit dues were also arranged. But the treaty of 1876, known as the Chefoo convention, which was negotiated between Sir Thomas Wade and the Chinese Government, has remained unaccepted by the British Government.
In 1880, the export coastwise to Hankow of Sze chuen opium was 927 pikuls. At Hankow it pays an ad valorem export and coasting duty of 7k per cent. It is known in the trade as Chuen-t'u, and sells at 14 taels, against 15.60 taels for Palung and 17 taels for Yunnan opium,—the quantity in each case being 100 Chinese ounces = of 133k lbs. avoirdupois. Yunnan opium is also exported.
Mr. Edkins says that China grown opium is not palatable even to the Chinese. Mr. Caine, British
consul at Hankow, writing in 1871, said that no considerations of an inconsiderable temporary excellence will ever induce the rich to purchase so inferior an article as the native drug.
Opium is at present largely consumed in the Archipelago, in China, 41 the Indo - Chinese countries, and in many parts of India, much in the same way in which wine, ardent spirits, mat liquor, and cider are consumed in Europe Stupor, reverie, and voluptuous listlessness an the immediate effects produced. In this state the individual can be at once and easily aroused tr exertion or business. No sickness, constipation or any other functional disturbance supervenes 01 each indulgence. When the habit is but moderatel: followed, it appears to occasion no greater effec than the proportionate indulgence in wine or othe spirituous liquors. Its deleterious character ha been much insisted on, but generally by partie who have had no experience of its effects. any other narcotic or stimulant, the habitual use o it is amenable to abuse, and, being more seductiv than other stimulants, perhaps more so ; but thi is certainly the utmost that can be safely charges to it. Millions consume it without any perni cious result, as millions do wine and spirit without any evil consequence. There is not know any person of long experience and competer judgment who has not come to this common-sens conclusion. Dr. Oxley, a physician and naturali. of eminence, and who had had a longer experienc than any other man of Singapore, where there wa a high rate of consumption of the drug, gave th following opinion The inordinate use, or nth( abuse, of the drug most decidedly does bring o early decrepitude, loss of appetite, and a morbi state of all the secretions ; but I have seen a ma who had used the drug for fifty years in modere tion without any evil effects ; and one man recollected in Malacca, who had so used it, \92 upwards of eighty. Several in the habit smoking it have assured me that, in moderatioi it neither impaired the functions nor shortens life, at the same time fully admitting the deh terions effects of too much.' There is not a wor of this that would not be equally true of the w and abuse of ardent spirits, wine, and perhal even of tobacco. The historian of Sumatra, who experience and good sense cannot be questioner came early to the very same conclusion ; ari the question of its superiority over ardent appears to have been for ever set at rest by tl high authority of Sir Benjamin Brodie. T1 effect of opium, when taken into the stomact he says, is not to stimulate, but to soothe tl nervous system. It may be otherwise in sort instances, but these are rare exceptions to tl general rule. The opium-eater,' he adds, is in passive state, satisfied with his own dreamy col dition, while under the influence of the drug. E is useless, but not mischievous. It is quite other wise with alcoholic liquors.' The editor has se( many smokers of the extract ; has purposely a amongst them, for prolonged occasions, in opium saloon of Madras, and has seen in Ind numerous children and grown-up people under tl influence of opium, without any evils resultir from it.