C01?NELL UNIVERSnY UBRARY ITHACA, N.Y, 14853 ff ,'L.t \ • • • • » X -' . 6 T**'"^ '-■:■"■,",'■ S \ii.- JohnM. Echols C: Section on Southeast A;;ia KROCH UP":AT{ COftNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 924 074 559 703 Cornell University Library The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924074559703 In compliance with current copyright law, Cornell University Library produced this replacement volume on paper that meets the ANSI Standard Z3 9.48- 19 84 to replace the irreparably deteriorated original. 1995 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. BEING SELECTIONS AND REFLECTIONS ON OUR Hsiatic ©pium poUcp a^^^^raffic.v BY H. H. T. CLEIFE, M.A., •JJiCTOR OF HARDTNGTON MANDHVILLE, SOMERSET. ' To do right, because it is right. Is noble in the scorn of consequence.' LONDON : ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW. YEOVIL: E. WHITBY & SON. 1892. PREFACE. A FEW months ago I resolved to prepare a lecture on the Opium Question, and I found when I began to read and to compile for the undertaking that on some of my headings there was very little to be found, while under other headings the matter was very considerable. After placing these collections and fragments side by side, the thought occurred to me that in this form they might possibly be of use to others beside myself. . The Opium Question I have dealt with under all its principal aspects, saying little on the historical phase, presuming as I do that that is tolerably well known to most persons. On such a subject originality is quite impossible. I have only attempted to bring together facts, hoping in this way greatly to increase their significance and encourage further inquiry. In the index is stated the author or source from which the extracts are taken, thus enabling the reader to judge for himself the value of any statement. I am pleased to see there is a new periodical called Darkest Russia, published by a committee formed in London for the purpose of making known the leading facts with regard to the Muscovite Jew. I wish I could suggest to philanthropists in Russia that they might publish a similar periodical entitled Darkest England, and devote its pages to iv PREFACE. the Opium Question and England's relation to it. Should each nation thus cause the other to 'cease to do evil,' a very great blessing to humanity would be the result. There may be some men in both countries who may be justified in taking up these causes, but let no man condemn the national sin of another country while he ignores his own nation's guilt. I have called the opium traffic ' England's Greatest National Sin' for these, among other, reasons : 1. Because we allow our Indian subjects to indulge in a vice which is unlawful in this country. 2. Because we sell opium in Burmah against the religion ajjd wishes of the people. / 3. Because we^ell it to China, and will not allow an extra ftax to be put on it when carried inland, thus preventing any province of China from protecting itself by a local prohibitive duty. ^ 4. Because it is a very great hindrance to Christian missions. Dr. Medhurst tells us, ' Almost the first word uttered by the Chinese when anything is said concerning the excellence of Christianity is, "Why do Christians bring us opium? . . . The vile drug has destroyed my son, has ruined my brother, and well-nigh led me to beggar my wife and children. Surely those who import such a deleterious substance, and injure me for the sake of gain, cannot be in possession of a better religion than my own."' This is a controversial subject, and let it be remembered that I plead on one side, viz., the anti-opium side, and have adduced, to prove my views, the strongest and most reliable evidence I can find. It is for others to refute these statements if possible. All who attempt it, in my opinion, will find that there are very many difficult questions to answer. Take the following four as examples : I. As the sale of opium is restricted in England, so that PREFACE. V it cannot be sold in any form without being labelled ' Poison,' why is it that in India it is sold without that most proper restriction ? 2. The former rulers of Burmah condemned opium-smok- ing, and punished the offenders with death. Why, then, should we, the present rulers of that country, give them such facilities as we do to procure that drug, and especially when by such conduct we encourage them to act contrary to the teaching of their religion ? 3. As the Indian opium is stronger, and therefore more injurious, than the same drug grown in China, why do we prevent the Chinese protecting themselves against it in any way which they may please, and are we justified in dictating the maximum tax to be put on it ? 4. Would the opium traffic be defended if it were not for the revenue obtained from it ? Perhaps there is no greater anomaly than the fact that her Most Gracious Majesty is both ' Defender of the Faith' and also a dealer in opium, selling it in very large wholesale quantities ; and what perhaps seems still more anomalous is that a single cake of the drug can be purchased at the Government stores for other than medicinal purposes. Moreover, her Majesty identifies herself with it so very closely that her initials are placed on the drug, and the stores are guarded by her soldiers. When our beloved Queen in 1858 took possession of India, the proclamation announcing her direct control renders homage to our national faith in God and in Christ — ' Firmly relying ourselves on the truth of Christianity, and acknow- ledging with gratitude the solace of religion.' Let these noble words inspire us to use every lawful effort, that no one may say : The same person who is styled ' Defender of the Faith ' may also be described as ' A seller of opium-balls for other than medicinal purposes.' I mean, of course, in the same limited sense as when we speak of 'the Queen's soldiers.' Ti PREFACE. Think not that I thus write from lack of loyalty, but rather, being a most loyal subject, I argue that, as our opium traffic is associated with the name of the best Queen who ever lived — and this is specially the foreigner's view of the subject — it affords an extra powerful reason for demanding an immediate reform. Those in power profess loyalty and affection to our beloved Queen ; let them show it by wiping out the darkest blot which, in a qualified sense, is connected with her most illustrious name. The 'Annual Reports on the Administration of the Bombay Presidency ' show that opium which is grown, manu- factured, and sold by the Indian representatives of our Christian Queen, Victoria, is beginning to find its way into Africa. In her early womanhood she was able to tell an African chief that the secret of England's greatness was the Bible. The majority of Englishmen concur with that state- ment Let them therefore demand that our Asiatic policy be not contrary to the teaching of God's Word, and thus up- hold our religion and the honour of our beloved Queen. A Blue-Book on the ' Consumption of Opium in India ' has just been published, which puts the statistical aspect of the question in rather a different light. The increase is officially accounted for in various ways ; among others, the substitution of duty-paid for illicit opium and increase in the population are mentioned. These considerations should be taken into account. The former, however, being incapable of proof, is not of much importance ; moreover, the fact remains that the Government returns on the consumption of opium in India are on the whole higher now than they were some years ago. I wish it to be understood that when in this book the increase of the sale of opium is mentioned, in all cases it is meant the in- crease in the sale of Government opium as officially re- ported. It should be remembered that even these figures PREFACE. vii do not represent the actual amount consumed, although they probably come much nearer than the statements of ten years ago. The question of the increase or decrease in the consumption of the drug is of some considerable import- ance; we are dealing, however, with pre-eminently an abstract one. Is our opium policy right or wrong? Are we carrying on a trade with weaker nations which we would not dare attempt to introduce among stronger ones ? We have already made it unlawful for the people of India to destroy themselves under the wheels of their idol Jugger- naut; to be consistent, we must render it as difficult as possible for them to commit the same crime with opium, and this can only be done by placing it under similar restrictions as in this country. The official document just referred to necessitates the suggestion that Appendix B should be read immediately after section lo at page 12, which will somewhat modify the picture there portrayed. My earnest hope and prayer is that this compilation of many earnest voices may send forth an echo which shall sink deep into some zealous hearts, stirring them up to put forth their best energies in this cause, and that by God's blessing it may tend to hasten the time when we as a nation shall have nothing more to do with what I have ventured to call ' England's Greatest National Sin.' I deeply feel how partially and insufficiently I have performed my task, and regret that it has not been undertaken by someone more qualified than myself to do it justice. H. H. T. C. The Rectory, Hardington, Yeovil, March, 1892. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PACE I. INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE I II. THE MALWA STATES AS AFFECTED BY THE OPIUM TREATIES l6 J I. BURMAH — OUR RELATION WITH THE OPIUM REVENUE 20 .'. CHINA — THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG 26 V. OPIUM AND OTHER DEMORALIZING NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA 38 VI. ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED 50 VII. THE OPIUM TRADE FROM A RELIGIOUS POINT OF VIEW 63 VIII. IMPORTANT TESTIMONIES 69 llX. MEDICAL OPINIONS- 77 ^ j X. THE FINANCIAL ASPECT 83 XI. SOME STATISTICS CONNECTED WITH THE OPIUM QUESTION 96 XII. THE OPIUM TRADE IS FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT- I02 Xin. CONCLUDING REMARKS II4 APPENDIX A 123 APPENDIX B 130 APPENDIX C 138 APPENDIX D 141 APPENDIX E 145 j: ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. CHAPTER I. INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. Our Responsibility. I. 'Whatever wrong there may have been in your mode of acquiring India, God sent it to you and it belongs to you, and the responsibility lies on the heart of the humblest Christian belonging to-day to this nation of Great Britain. Before I go on, ask yourself for a single moment why you imagine God sent you India. To aggrandize yourselves, do you imagine ? Do you think that that is the way the eternal Father is working behind the phenomena of nature? I be- lieve that He sent you India because specially to this nation had been vouchsafed the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ, because, although there may be all kinds of super- stitions and idolatries in the external manifestation of popular Hindooism, yet deep down under it all, in the old philosophies of that race, there lies a magnificent foundation for the Gospel, and a reaching after the infinite God in His unity, which the message of Christ alone can completely 2 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. satisfy. And God gave you India that you might feed India with the Gospel. God gave you India that you might take out, in all its majesty and purity, the magnificent doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth, as the visible and moral embodiment of an all-pervading omnipresence, which they think of as Pan- theism, which in itself can never be seen by any man. Christ made the omnipresence of God personal and accessible to us, and when you bring Christ in all His purity and power and graft Him on to that magnificent foundation of philo- soph)', those whose eyes are opened to accept Him realize that He satisfies every single instinct of humanity and opens the golden gates of Heaven. I want to ask you how you have done it. I want to ask you how you have fulfilled during all these years that great responsibility laid upon you by God. Have you done it ? In many ways you have. ' No man who has ever been in India would dare to stand upon this platform and depreciate our Indian administration in the main. I believe that India has been administered justly and kindly and patiently, and in every way calculated to make the people appreciate our rule. We have done everything for India. We have saved them from foreign invasion, whereas in days gone by their land was periodically drenched with blood by such awful invasions as that alluded to by Tennyson, when he says : ' " Ages after, while in Asia he, who led the wild Moguls, Timur built his ghastly tower of eighty thousand skulls." ' This is no exaggeration. We have saved them from such horrors. We have saved them from internecine warfare. We have given them peace amongst themselves. We have become the " film of oil poured upon the troubled surface that keeps the sea from breaking." We have improved their commerce and their agriculture and their irrigation. We INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. 3 have given them unspeakable boons. Above all, we have given them an education, which, with such wonderful facility and power, they have assimilated, as to cause now a great demand on the part of those that are educated to take a further share in the government of their own country. We have been a boon to them. We have been true and kind to India. We have set them an example of integrity and of incorruptibility. We are ruling them now with that which is the best Civil Service in all the world, but — 1 want my " BUT " put in capital letters — I say there is a " but." I venture to quote the story of the American who was being shown around Dublin. He was shown the magnificent cathedral, to erect which no money had been spared. He was shown the splendid nest of schools for the education of the people, provided at a vast price, and lastly he was shown an enormous brewery, with railways of its own, and steamers of its own on its own canal, owned by the donor of the cathedral and the schools^ and he said, " Here you have got a strange and wonderful man, for he knows how to run education, salvation, and damnation, all in his own person." Oh, it is not an exaggeration ! I say it is true, in a certain sense, of our own rule in India. Our "but" is a very big one, because we have, in certain prominent matters, lowered the standard of morality existing before. ' You may ask, " Do you mean to say that the morals of the Hindoo are better than the morals of the Christian ?" I have not said so, but I do say this — that there was no native ruler before our time who ever made an income out of the vices of his people. The vices were there, the drink was there. To a great extent the eating and smoking of opium and ganja was there, but it was there, not because of, but in spite of, the highest principles inculcated by native religions, and we have just taken it and we have formulated 4 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. it, and we have financed it, and we have so effected it that the Indian people clearly see that, whatever may be the nominal standard of our integrity, we practically consider finance first and morality second, and in that way we are doing a deep and terrible injury to India. We are lowering their standard of morals. We are placing ourselves in the position of tempters to India.' The Opium Trade in British India. 2. This opium is made up in a different way from the opium which is prepared for exportation to China, and is packed in chests of a different size and description. One or two of these chests are sent to the ' Collector '(Magistrate) of every district, and it is sold by one of the officers of the Collector's establishment to licensed vendors at the fixed price ; and they retail it to the people. A chairman of the East India Company, Mr. St. George Tucker, briefly de- scribed it when denouncing the India opium policy : ' Finally, we established retail shops, and brought it to every man's door.' The profit between the cost to the Government and the price charged the licensee is very great. Besides this large profit, the license brings in a considerable revenue. These two items constitute the opium branch of the 'Abkari,' or Excise revenue. The form of indulgence in opium in India used to be eating it. Latterly, the practice of smoking it has taken a great hold on the infatuated victims. It may easily be understood what facilities there are for the former practice among the cultivators. ' Wherever opium is grown it is eaten, and the more it is grown the more it is eaten. This is one of the worst features of the-opium question. We are demoralizing our own subjects in India. One half of the crimes in the opium districts, murders, rapes, and affirays, have INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. their origin in opium eating.' ' One opium cultivator de- moralizes a whole village.' This strong testimony was borne by Mr. A. Sym, a gentleman who had spent eleven years in the opium district of Gorakhpoor, and for eighteen months had charge of the East India Company's branch opium agency there.* Her Majesty's Initials on Opium Balls. 3. Some years ago, in India, I visited the great opium factory at Patna, and there it was a painful sight to see the initials of her Majesty, the Empress of India, ' V. R. & I.,' stamped on the balls of opium that were going down to Calcutta for export to China. I saw them myself. That factory is one giving employment to 3,000 persons, and over it there waves the flag which we say has ' Braved a thousand years The battle and the breeze ' — the flag of Great Britain. It was guarded by 200 soldiers of the Queen, and Empress of India. I think that if Her Majesty knew that she was the actual producer of this accursed drug, which, as we know, has for years past been so destructive throughout the vast millions of China, and which is now working its vile effects among her own subjects in India, she would do something to put an end to this nefarious traffic. The Presidency of India where Opium is chiefly produced. 4. For the most part, Indian opium is produced in the Bengal Presidency, of which Calcutta is the capital ; and the * ' Facts and Evidence relating to the Opium Trade.' — -W. S. Fry, P-39- 6 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. manufacture is chiefly carried on at Patna, not for medicinal purposes. The drug is treated in a special way for the purpose of being smoked. It was made slightly more profitable to the ryot (farmer) to grow the poppy, for sale to the Government, than to raise any legitimate article of commerce. Yet there has ever been some difificulty in getting sufficient lands for the purpose. So in 1826, when the production in the Bengal Presidency was not nearly adequate to the demand, attention was turned to Malwa opium, the product of the native States of Central India ; and a special agreement was come to with the rulers of Rajpootana and Malwa. Spread of the Opium Plague elsewhere under the British Flag. 5. In the British Crown colony known as the Straits Settlements, of which the principal town is Singapore, the reckless and devastating opium policy of the Government of India has been copied, and carried to such a pitch as to evoke an energetic protest from the Chinese themselves, usually so submissive in foreign lands. Chinese and Indian immigration to the Straits Settlements is encouraged by the local British authorities. When the poor immigrants arrive, they find unparalleled temptations to the opium habit. Nearly one half of the revenue of the colony is raised by fostering, and pandering to, this awful vice. At least two missionaries on this account have refused to take the usual Government grant-in-aid to schools, feeling that the receipt of the price of blood was not permissible in Christian work, and, if received, would blight rather than help their efforts. Some of the streets in Singapore are crowded with opium-dens, outside of each of which is conspicuously and unblushingly INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. 7 exhibited a board inscribed ' Licensed Opium Shop,' with its translation in Chinese. In July, 1890, the authorities of the Chinese Thien Hok Temple at Singapore adopted the extraordinary step of calling a meeting upon the subject, ' because,' as the circular convening it said, ' it is needful to deliberate about petition- ing the Upper and Lower Houses of the Parliament of Great Britain to put a stop to the opium trade.' On the appointed day (July 17), considerably more than 1,000 Chinese attended, and by three o'clock in the after- noon 990 had signed the petition, while many took copies away to secure other signatures. Missionaries and other Christians also took up the matter, and ultimately a petition signed by over 11,000 residents of Singapore was sent to Sir Joseph W. Pease, M.P., for presentation to Parliament. After referring to ' the terrible evils of opium-smoking among so many of the thousands of the Chinese who crowd to these parts of the British possessions,' the petitioners pray that the policy of British administration towards Chinese labouring on British soil be ' not to ruin them morally, physically, and materially, by affording facilities for carrying on the traffic in this most pernicious drug. Your petitioners, therefore, pray your Honourable House to address Her Majesty the Queen upon the subject of the above-mentioned evils, with a view to the immediate prohibition of the growth of the poppy, and the traffic in opium, in and from any of Her Majesty's dominions, except for strictly medicinal purposes.' Degrad.\tion of British Administration at LUCKNOW. 6. How the opium pestilence strikes a visitor to India, who sees its causes and fruit for the first time, is vividly illustrated in Mr. W. S. Caine's brief word-picture of an 8 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. opium-den at Lucknow, contained in the volume which is one of the results of his tour in India in 1888-89.* He says : ' A large native house is passed, through the door of which streams in and out a swarm of customers. It is perhaps three o'clock in the afternoon. Enter- ing with them, you will find yourself in a spacious but very dirty court-yard, round which are ranged fifteen or twenty small rooms. The stench is sickening, the swarm of flies intolerable, and there is something strange and weird in the faces of those coming in from the street. This is the establishment of another Government contractor, the opium farmer. At the entrance sits a comely, well-dressed native woman, whose husband is sorting the arriving customers into the least-crowded of the side-rooms. Before her is a table, on which are large bowls rapidly filling with copper coins. Enter one of the small rooms. It has no window, and is very dark ; but in the centre is a small char- coal fire, whose lurid glow lights up the faces of nine or ten human beings — men and women — lying on the floor like pigs in a sty. A young girl, some fifteen years of age, has charge of each room, fans the fire, lights the opium-pipe, and holds it in the mouth of the last comer, till his head falls heavily on the body of his or her predecessor. ' In no East-End gin-palace, in no lunatic or idiot asylum, will you see such horrible destruction of God's image in the face of man as appears in the countenances of those in the preliminary stages of opium drunkenness. Here you may see some handsome young married woman, nineteen or twenty years of age, sprawling on the senseless bodies of men, her fine brown eyes flattened and dull with coming stupor, and her lips drawn convulsively back from her glitter- ing white teeth. Here is a younger girl, sitting among a group of newly-arrived customers, singing some lewd romance, * ' Picturesque India.' INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. 9 as they hand round the pipes. There is a bonny httle lad of six or seven, watching his father's changing face with a dreadful indifference. At night these dens are crowded to excess, and it is estimated that there are upwards of 12,000 persons in Lucknow enslaved by this hideous vice. " Green " hands can get drunk for an anna, or even less ; but by degrees more and more opium is needed, till hardened sots require 200 or 300 drops of thick opium, mixed with tobacco, to secure complete intoxication. An opium sot is the most hopeless of all drunkards. Once in the clutches of this fiend, everything gives way to his fierce promptings. His victim only works to get more money for opium. Wife, children, home, health, and life itself at last, are all sacrificed to his degrading passion.' India began her Opium Trade with China, not by Selling it, but by Giving it away. 7. The serious beginning of the evil may be traced back to rather more than a century ago, when the profligate Warren Hastings, Governor-General of India, finding that there was a small market for opium for medicinal purposes in China, conceived the abominable idea of inculcating a taste for the drug as a sensuous indulgence among the Chinese, for the purpose of developing a trade in India-grown opium. With that object ships were sent to the Chinese coast, and quantities of the pernicious drug were given away to the in- habitants. The next year the same ships carried it for sale at a low price ; and thus the disastrous trade sprung up. In India, Warren Hastings obtained seeds, advanced money to native cultivators of the poppy, bought from them the crude opium resulting, and had it manufactured at a Government factory for export to China. The system thus lo ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. wickedl}' begun is continued b)' the British Government to this da)'. Wherever the Indian Government estabhshed an opium plantation, the opium vice, as a natural sequence, grew also. Even in the earlier stages of this plague, Europeans in India, as well as natives, became its victims. Lord Clive, who was for some time Governor-General, was a slave to the opium habit. He would sit ' silent and torpid for hours,' and, again, 'in acute physical suffering.' He committed suicide at the age of forty-nine. Anti-Opium Meetings and Petitions. 8. A large anti-opium meeting has been held in Bombay, under the leadership of the bishop, who feels strongly on the question. Another took place on April 15, 1891, in Madras, under the auspices of the Native Christian Literary Society. Petitions against the traffic are being widely signed in Southern India. g. One of the most remarkable petitions that has yet come to hand froni India is the following one from a large number of farmers, mostly cultivating their own land. They know, as well as we do, that the cessation of the opium traffic will mean no suffering to their class. Every- where in India where the poppy is grown, it is the rajahs and the supreme Government that obtain the profits. To the Honour.^ble the Commons of Great Britain AND IrEL.'VND in PARLIAMENT ASSEMBLED. The Petition of the undersigned : Sheweth : That your Petitioners desire to call your attention to an evil of the gravest nature, which threatens the welfare of the millions of this portion of the British Empire. INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. ii This great evil is the Opium vice, which is ministered to by the large facilities for its indulgence afforded by Government by the places licensed for its sale and consumption. That the destruction of human happiness and life by the Opium vice is so terrible, and its continued extension so appalling to contemplate, that your petitioners pray that immediate measures may be taken to stay this desolating scourge. (i) By the Government of India retiring from, and prohibiting in these lands, the growth and manufac- ture of Opium ; and (2) By enacting the same protection to the people of these dominions against Opium consumption as is aiforded to the people of Great Britain, under the Pharmacy Act of 1868, by which it is unlawful for Opium to be sold except by duly qualified chemists and druggists for medicinal purposes, and then only under a label inscribed with the word ' Poison.' That your Petitioners plead for equal justice for the vast populations of India and. Burmah in the above mentioned matter, with their British fellow-subjects in Great Britain. That your Petitioners also respectfully express the hope and desire that the Imperial Government will, with the stoppage of the growth, manufacture, and common sale of the Opium poison in India, make it legally, as it is now morally, criminal for British subjects to carr}', send, or sell, or be partners or agents in carrying, sending, or selling this devastating drug to, or in the great neighbouring countr}' of China, or elsewhere in the East, thus ending what is practically a war policy towards a nation with whom Great Britain professes to be on terms of peace. And your Petitioners will ever pray. 12 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. A VERY Serious Charge. 10. What would you think of the brewer who would only let a public-house on the condition that the landlord would sign an agreement to the effect that if he did not sell a certain quantity of strong drink each six months he would be subject to a fine ? And what do you think of the fact established beyond a doubt, that the Government of India, for whose conduct we as the imperial authority are fully responsible, are guilty of a worse sin, for we act in a similar manner with regard to the drug opium, which is in its effects many times worse than alcohol. Will not a Parliament who commence their proceedings with prayer wipe out this national blot ? Will not a nation many of whom pray that all our Parliamentary deliberations may be ' for the advancement of God's glory and the good of His Church,' also bestir themselves to demand that this abomination shall be no longer laid to our charge ? Let us put forth our most earnest efforts to this end, remembering that ' Orare est laborare.' An ingenious device connected with the Indian opium administration was issued in March, 1889 (and which is still in force), by the Accountant-General, for the guidance of certain officials in the Bombay Presidency. It empowers them to refund any penalties incurred from deficiencies of sales, if they make it up in subsequent months. Notice the opposite regulations by the same Government as regards opium. Here in England the sale is restricted, while in India the sale is encouraged — yea, even enforced. The Testimony of Some Missionaries. 11. A missionary in an up-country station in the Bombay Presidency writes : ' A short while after my arrival here I INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. 13 noticed a group of villagers, and suspected that they were given to eating ganja. On inquiry, I found my suspicions well grounded ; they were addicted to this habit, and a young lad of twelve was just commencing to take the drug. The railway has not yet come to these parts, nor has the telegraph- wire, but opium, ganja, and liquor have been sold for years past. The other day I was wondering that the villagers came to the missionary in charge for medicine instead of going to the Government dispensary. I was afterwards told that these ignorant people say that the Government keeps the dispensary in order to kill a certain number of natives. Has this belief originated in the sale of ctpvixa., ganja, etc., and their evil effects ? To me it seems very probable.' Ravages of the Opium Plague in Smaller Cities. 12. Dr. Morison, Presbyterian missionary at Rampore Beauleah, Bengal, having been asked for information concerning the opium plague in that place, towards the close of 1889, visited the Government opium-dens, and replied in part thus to Mr. Donald Matheson, Chairman of the Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade, London : ' I stepped into a den, and found twelve men sitting down to their pipes. My sudden entrance was followed by a rush for the door, but I stayed them, and told them to tell me all about the habit. Many of the smokers I knew personally, all belonging to the labouring classes. On looking over the smokers, I saw that most of them were sallow-complexioned, and one in the last stage of emaciation. I asked what was the effect of smoking upon them. They all,- with one accord, said that it dried up their bodies, and the craving for it was such that they could not give it up. They said that if they gave it up they would die, " but, sir, if you would give us sorne medicine to help us, then we might give it up." 14 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. ' I asked how many men came there. They said about fifty or more daily. This was the testimony of the shop- keeper, whose interest it is not to show too large a consump- tion, lest his license should be enhanced. I found none of them willing that these deus should be extended. On the contrary, all the men implored me to do what I could to have them closed, "only let us die first, for if you deprive us of it suddenly we must die." "Ah," said the shopkeeper, "don't think the Maharanee (the Queen) will close these shops ; she gets too much money out of these opium, ganja, and liquor shops to i/iink of closing them." I replied, "Not so, you are wrong ; if the good Maharanee and the good people of England knew that these shops are demoralizing and destroying the people of this country, they would shut them, and deliver you from the temptation."' An A.meric.a,n Missionary on the Government Shambles. 13. Rev. Arthur \V. Prautch, an American missionary in Bombay, who is well acquainted with the haunts and the homes of the people, writes, on December 22, 1890: ' The thought oppresses me that, in this city, there are 10,000 persons addicted to the opium vice. This involves untold misery for the families of the victims, as well as for the victims themselves. There are two ways in which opium is sold: (i) in pellets to be taken home ; (2) in liquid form, to be smoked in the licensed retailer's den. I have seen forty customers waiting at one shop to be served. Why do they buy ? Some, because they are slaves to it. Others are nurses to European children, who put opium into their finger nail, and let somebody's baby suck itself into a stupor : the mother, seeing the quiet child, and not knowing the cause, is pleased with the nurse. Others are INDIA AND THE OPIUM TRADE. 15 native mothers, who go out to work, and who dose their children while they follow their employment It has been remarked to me by strangers, " How very quiet many native children are !" Yes, they are very quiet ; but what will the harvest be? Of course, these drugged European and native children will grow up with an awful craving for opium and stimulants, and will soon make shipwreck of hfe. 'As I write and think of the scenes of these licensed human shambles, the masses of people who are suffering through this officially-fostered vice, the army of children who are getting the insatiable passion for opium, my heart is bowed in sadness. I see no light except from a righteous God, who now bears with the British nation. It seems that heartless statesmen, who tempt these poor people to their destruction, will not move unless compelled to do so, and we in India cannot move them. It is never right for a Government to collect revenue at such a fearful price. What will the condition of things be when the habit becomes more universal? Who will shoulder the responsibility of the harvest of suffering ?' CHAPTER II. THE MALWA STATES AS AFFECTED BY THE OPIUM TREATIES. The Opium ' Treaties ' with the Subordinate Native Rulers. I. The whole of India south of the Himalayas (with the exception of very small portions subject to China, France, and Portugal, and the little States of Nepaul and Bhutan) is absolutely under the control of the British Government for all imperial purposes. This is true even of the tributar)' native States. That the Government of India claim this authority over the native States is proved by a proclama- tion of the British Government declaring that the native States can publish no newspaper without permission, and persons contravening this authority will be forcibly expelled by the British officials. On all occasions, in all imperial matters, the English Government has, without the slightest hesitancy, interfered in the affairs of these minor powers. These States, paying as they do more or less tribute, are really governed by English officials called 'political resi- dents,' whose word, as Lord Macaulay says in his essays, is absolute law. These officials dictate these ' treaties, ' which the British Government alone have power to alter, suspend, or instantly annul. From these facts we may judge the true value of the so-called opium ' treaties ' with the native THE MALWA STATES AND THE OPIUM TREATIES. 17 States of India. In the majority of cases they are not even in the pretended form of treaties, but, Hke the ukase with regard to newspapers, are Government orders by proclama- tion. Space forbids giving a summary of tliese ' treaties.' The following is a quotation from Article 9 of one of them, which may serve, however, as an example. ' This engagement shall hold good as long as the British Government deem it expedient' In 1829 it was abolished by the authority of our Government. The following extract may also be interesting to some. In the first treaty with the Meyong Abors, by Article 13 the chiefs agree to bring an annual tribute of pigs and fowls, whilst the British Government agrees if the Abors behave themselves, and give no trouble, to give them annually — 80 bottles of rum (eighty). 2 seers* of Abkari opium (two). 2 maunds (168 lb.) of tobacco (two). This is followed on behalf of England by the seal and signature of H. S. BiVAR, Major, Deputy Commissioner of the First-Class, Luckhimpore, and Agent of the Governor-General for the North-East Frontier. Then follows the signatures of the illiterate savage chiefs — LoMiUR Gham, his mark x Tankoor Gham, his mark x Yabang Gham, his mark x Chaplur Gham, his mark x Taying Gham his mark x and thirty-one others, all signing ' his mark x ' Then follows another agreement with the Kebang. * Two seers contain 6,558 poisonous doses of four grains each. 2 iS ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. The Growth of the Poppv in the Malwa District MAKES IT the CaNCER OF InDIA. 2. That cancer must be cut out. Just as the supreme Government, fifty years ago, formed a system of pohce throughout the Malwa States, for the suppression of Thugs and Dacoits (bands of armed thieves and murderers), so must the supreme Government, in the general interests of the Empire, make a clean sweep of the opium trade throughout those States, as well as in the rest of its dominions. It is probable that there will be attempts at compromise. John Bunyan, in his great allegory of ' The Holy War,' tells how that when Immanuel (Christ) took the great town of ' Mansoul ' (the human heart) from Diabolus (Satan), Diabolus earnestly entreated, first, that he might have half the town ; when that failed he asked for a smaller part ; a third time he asked for a private residence therein ; then, on the refusal of these terms, that he might be allowed occasionally to visit the town, or, failing that, to send messengers to it. But one and all the claims of Diabolus were refused. 3. Wherever opium is grown, however much there may be an endeavour to only grow it for foreign export, the use of opium is almost sure to follow, as it has followed in our own Bengal Presidency, which is the most opium-consum- ing district in the whole of India, and as it has followed in the Malwa States, which, as Maurice Gregory describes, are so thoroughly drenched with opium that there has been the deterioration of a race which was considered the finest of the races in India. So much was this the case that the comment was made that if England ever withdrew from the Government of India, the Rajpoots would take their place THE MALWA STATES AND THE OPIUM TREATIES. 19 as the rulers of the country. He says that if you look at the Rajpoots now you will find that they have been so weakened, and that there has been so much physical deterioration through the use of opium, that no one would ever dream of saying such a thing at the present time. He, Mr. Maurice Gregory , also asserts that ' enormous quantities of opium are smuggled from Malwa into the Punjab, and that this is a fact no one doubts who knows the country. Moreover, the Government reports say nothing of the vast quantities consumed in the Mahva district.' ^ CHAPTER III. BURMAH—OUR RELATION WITH THE OPIUM REVENUE. Lower Burmah. I. Though the poppy is not grown here, opium is used in larger quantities than in any other part of our Indian Empire. The price is exceedingly high. The retail price in Rangoon is equal to the weight of the drug in silver. This causes great destitution among the wives and children of the con- sumers, who must go without food and clothing while the smoker satisfies his craving. Upper Burmah. Under the old kings of Burmah the growth and the use of the poppy were alike prohibited. Since the British annexation, however, shops for the distribution of opium have been opened at all the great Government centres. The poppy is also grown in the upper Chindwin district. Lower Burmah, and its Large Opium Revenue. 2. One house pays a sum of 158,000 rupees for license duty alone, and the Indian Government acknowledges that from Lower Burmah it has more revenue from opium, pro- portionately, than from any other part of India. OUR RELATION WITH THE OPIUM REVENUE. 21 Inexcusable Conduct of Officials. Now, if one thing could bring out more clearly than another the exceeding carelessness of the Indian Govern- ment of the welfare of its subjects, surely nothing could be plainer than that which we have in this instance, that after it had been made plain that the great source of crime in Burmah was opium-smoking, and that it was destroying the vitality of the race, the Government should nevertheless, after a temporary sacrifice on its part, allow the state of things to become worse than before. It brings before us very painfully the power of revenue as affecting officials in Government positions, and the necessity for the people of this country to deal themselves with this matter, and to speak out plainly and straightforwardly regarding officialism in relation to questions of morality. Officialism is not to be trusted in a moral question of this kind. What have we to do in this matter of Burmah ? I said that I believed that Burmah will yet prove to be our salva- tion in dealing with the opium traffic ; and what we have to do now is to press very urgently upon our Government here that a great wrong has been committed, and that what the Burmese themselves have all along asked for — the entire suppression of the opium traffic — shall be given them. One of the points brought out by Sir Charles Aitchison in his memorandum was that all law-abiding classes in Burmah were clear and plain in this request ; and he adds that to yield to this desire would be the only popular course in Burmah. And surely this is a case where we have a right to insist that the population of Burmah should be heard, and that steps should at once be taken, not to restrict, but to put down once for all, the sale of the drug throughout Burmah. And if we put it down in Burmah, surely we can have nothing to say in defence of its use in any other country. 22 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. We accused King Theebaw of Wholesale Murder, but what are we doing ? 3. We open our opium-dens, and we open our drink- shops, and iAey have done to death quite as many victims as King Theebaw ever did. And, therefore, the opium traffic in Burmah comes home to us with a very strong lesson. It is not only a vile traffic which we have been carrying on in China, but it is, as we see in the case of Upper Burmah, a policy recently inaugurated under the very Government now in power. Let us look fairly in the face the fact that this indicates a policy, a distinct policy persevered in, in spite of protests from the inhabitants them- selves, in spite of the revelations of our officials, and in spite of the representations made to the Government by those who had the administration of affairs in Burmah. The Testimony of some Missionaries. 4. How the opium policy of a Government which is Christian in name tends to thwart the work of ambassadors for Christ, while it attacks home life, has lately been forcibly depicted by the Rev. A. T. Rose, a missionary in Burmah. He says : ' May I give one of many similar instances ? I am in the town of Danubyu, and call at a house where the mother and two daughters are busy making thinbyu mats. I give and receive in return a polite salutation. I ask, "Can you read ?" The mother says, " Yes, we can read." " Would you like to read one of my books ?" The mother asks what kind of books. I reply, " About Jesus and His religion." The mother answered, " No ; I know enough of your religion." After a pause I said, '' May I ask what you mean ?" " What do I meaii T she replied with flashing eyes. " Twenty years ago my husband was an industrious and OUR RELATION WITH THE OPIUM REVENUE. 23 respectable man ; he had paddy fields and bullocks, and two large boats, and traded to Rangoon ; now all is gone, and I and my daughters have to work night and day to supply him with opium ; and my two sons are going the same way !" I afterwards saw this man, a mere skeleton, a wreck, body and soul. The two sons, then in an opium and gambling den, soon found their way to the gaol. There are thousands of similar families in Lower Burmah.' 5. The late Dr. Duff, the well-known missionary, writes : ' Before our advent in Burmah, the use of opium was for- bidden, and consequently unknown. In Rangoon there are several licensed shops for the purpose of smoking it. I pur- posely visited one of them. Anything more filthy, more utterly demoralizing, more perfectly disgusting to civilized or even uncivilized humanity, I have never seen.' Such is the character, such are the results, of an article of trade manufactured and sold by the agents of our Queen, and in her name. An Appeal from the R.4ngoon Missionary Conference. 6. Immediately before the annexation there was presented to Lord Dufferin, the Governor-General, an earnest appeal from the members and representatives at the Rangoon Missionary Conference. This appeal was written on December, 1885, about ten days before the proclamation of the annexation of Upper Burmah. It says : ' While we rejoice over the opportunities, securities, and advantages bestowed by British rule upon the provinces of Lower Burmah since their conquest, we cannot but regret the simultaneous introduction of some serious evils that have manifestly limited the influence and extent of British beneficence. The Burmese are by their religion and dis- 24 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. position a sober and temperate race, and for many centuries have enjoyed immunity from the evils resulting from the traffic in intoxicants that have overcome and demoralized many of the inhabitants of Lower Burmah. Some of us remember well the condition and character of the Burmese before they were brought under British sway, and must declare that, though they were oppressed, enslaved, and impoverished by the tyranny and avarice of their own Government, they were yet generally and habitually peace- ful and abstemious. But their principles have not been strong enough to resist the temptations presented by the public sale of opium and liquors licensed by the British Government ; and evils of decay, disease, and disorder have, to a very wide extent and serious degree, resulted from the increasing use of those intoxicants by the inhabitants of Lower Burmah. The provincial reports bear ample witness to the existence and prevalence of these evils ; and so we will not here adduce any evidences or proofs of that. ' We have referred to the sale and use of these injurious luxuries in Lower Burmah, as a reason for our present appeal on behalf of the simple and sober inhabitants of Upper Burmah ; for though, till now, they, like their neighbours in former times, have been down-trodden, hard-pressed, and cruelly wronged, they have yet been in large measure happily exempt from the temptations and effects of those evils that evidently and greatly hinder the progress and limit the prosperity of Lower Burmah. We freely admit that a few of the weakest of them have blindly yielded to the in- temperate example of some of the hillmen and Europeans with whom they have come into contact, but we confidently assert that, generally, they are obedient to the abstinent precept of their religion, and opposed to the intemperate practices of their neighbours. It would, therefore, we believe, be a deplorable calamity if the blessings that are OUR RELATION WITH THE OPIUM REVENUE. 25 now to be conferred upon Upper Burmah should be counteracted or limited by the licensing of trade in these deleterious distillations and manufactures.' Whether from this or from some other cause, a recommendation was nevertheless sent from the Govern- ment of India, one part of which is as follows : ' No shops whatever will be licensed for the sale of opium, inasmuch as all respectable classes of Burmans are against legalizing the consumption of opium in the new province. Anyone found selling opium to persons other than Chinese, or transporting opium in quantity above three tolas (which is a little above an ounce), or keeping a saloon for consuming opium, will be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding five hundred rupees, or to three months' rigorous imprisonment, or to both. As traffic in opium was absolutely prohibited under the Burmese Government, there will be no hardship in thus proscribing opium dealings.' Surely that seems very fair on the part of the Indian Government. We ask ourselves how it is that already in Upper Burmah there are no fewer than fourteen of these terrible licensed houses, each of which is a centre for the distribution, through a large number of other houses, of this death-dealing drug. CHAPTER IV. CHINA— THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY '■'-" DRUG. Mr. Passmore Edwards on the Opium War. I. There can be no doubt that the opium war was one of the most unjust and iniquitous crimes ever perpetrated by one nation on another. In the first place England, through her merchants and East India Company, broke the moral law by producing and selling a poison which demoralized a large portion of the human race. In the second p lace, it openly violated the laws of the Chinese Empire by smuggling the poison within its borders. And, i n the third place, it treated with contempt its own instructions and engagements. British consular agents had been in- structed — ' To take special notice of all prohibitions, so that it may admonish all British subjects against carrying on an illicit commerce.' Lord Palmerston, who was Foreign Secretary at the time, had signified to British merchants at Canton that their country's protection would not be afforded them if they violated the laws of the empire with which they traded. His language is so explicit that I will quote it : ' No' piUiecLlOh can be allorded Lu (diiLib le British mer- chants to violate the laws of the country with which they THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 27 trade. Any loss, therefore, which such persons may suffer in consequence of the more effectual execution of the Chinese laws on this subject must be borne by the parties who have brought the loss on themselves by their own acts.' Nothing could be more explicit and satisfactory than this intimation. But, like every other injunction, human and divine, it was treated with supreme contempt by the British Government, and, what is more unaccountable still, the British people stood tamely by and endorsed the iniquity. It was bad enough to smuggle poison into an empire, and infinitely worse to inflict vast punishment on that empire because its authorities, in their own defence, attempted to protect the morals and the lives of its own citizens. That was not only adding insult to injury, but heaping up crime on crime. In fact, I cannot conceive of anything more absolutely iniquitous than the opium war. It may with propriety be denominated infernal. Any war is bad enough, even a war of defence, as it involves the loss of life, property, and moral and material devastation. But a war of aggression — a war to obtai n mon ev under false pretej ices — a war carried on ten thousand miles away on a people that never did us any harm, but whom we had much abused — such a war, proclaimed and sustained by a professedly Christian people on a pagan empire, is so devoid of all that is human, that I am astonished that beings calling themselves men, and more particularly Englishmen, could have restrained their indig-'^ nation in contemplating it. Well might Harriet Martineau in her ' Thirty Years' Peace ' exclaim : ' The great wonder to succeeding generations will be that Englishmen of a past generation bore the heavy guilt of the transaction so easily.' Had any of the nations of antiquity committed such a national crime — had Tyre, or Carthage, or Rome committed 28 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. it — English divines would point to it as an historic instance of the inferiority of heathen to Christian ages. It would be spoken of as an example of the infinite depravity of man- kind before the Christian faith dawned on the world. Or had a modern nation waged such a war — had Russia, for instance, even attempted it in Turkey, or France in Algeria, or America in Japan — the English press would have rung with virtuous indignation. But England — Protestant England — England that is never tired of boasting of her love of honesty and justice — enacts the guilty part ; and journalists, divines, and statesmen, with but few exceptions, instead of being stung to indignation, and feeling on their foreheads the burning brand of shame, stood tamely by, while devils might laugh and angels weep. No doubt this will be considered strong language, but it is true. I like to call a spade a spade, and crime crime. Edward Baines, in speaking of the opium trade before the war, called it : ' A nefarious system of organized and daring contraven- tion of the laws of China. Its elements are unlimited bribery, violence, and deceit.' But tell it not in Gath, and publish it not in Askalon, that a mighty, free Christian nation let slip the dogs of war, prostituted its name, and blotted its banner with blood, in order to deepen, extend, and perpetuate this great iniquity. {From a speech delivered at the Guildhall, Bath, on January 9, 1858.) Britain's Crime against China. 2. ' You have only got to read an unprejudiced history like Mr. Justin McCarthy's " History of Our Own Times " to realize the iniquity of our deahngs with China. I ask any man what he would feel if, in going down the street, he saw some very powerful man offer some poisoned drugs, in the THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 29 form of sweets, to a little feeble child, and threatening him with some weapon of destruction if he refused to take them. If after a time he had made the child take them, and had provoked him to a kind of semi-impotent resistance, and if he had then punished that child and burnt his house to the ground, you would say that that man was unworthy of the name of a civilized being. And yet I am not using the language of exaggeration or hyperbole if I say that is what you have done to China. If you look back over that history it is almost incredible that men and women can sit down with such a terrible stigma as that upon their nation. Look back to those days when we propagated, in every way, the smuggling of opium into China, which gave the Chinese people their first taste and their first appetite — look back to the time of our first Chinese war, of which our greatest statesman said that a war more iniquitous in its origin, more calculated to cover England with disgrace, he had never even heard of before. Look at the time of the seizure of the lorcha Arrow, a smuggler illegally flying the English flag, and to the misery and evil that came from it, and that provocation of the Chinese into hostility which made it absolutely necessary for us to subdue them with no little cruelty, and to burn the Summer Palace to the ground, and you will find as black a page of history belonging to this country of ours as there is to be found in the records of any nation in the world. I say that we ought to be ashamed of it and that we ought to repent of it. We ought to cease to do evil and learn to do well. I do not believe in " retribu- tion." But I believe, as Lamartine says, that if a man dares to bind the chain of slavery round his fellow-man, surely God Almighty secretly binds the other end of the chain round the man himself. I believe, as Emerson said, '"Crime and punish- ment grow upon the same stem ; the one is the supplement and the complement of the other." ' 30 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. 3. As a nation, we have these many years been sowing in China unrighteousness, desolation, and woe, and the Church of Christ has stood supinely by. She has looked quietly on while the Mammon-worship of our Anglo-Indian Govern- ment has slowly coiled in ever tighter folds the chain of a horrible vice around the Chinese race. From step to step our country has plunged into ever-deeper guilt. The brute force of the smuggler was vile enough, but the pressure which constrained a great race to legalize a traffic to its own undoing was an infamy, and the stony-heartedness that refused in 1869 the piteous entreaty of China's statesmen for the revocation of that legal bondage was a worse infamy still. Now we see China in its length and breadth cursed with the great curse of this opium plague, and England, Christian England, has done it. And still we go on and on, persisting in this national crime, and the Christian Church has contented herself with occasional resolutions in her Church courts, which had far better never have been passed, for practically they have meant nothing. Surely these things ought not so to be. However right and just it might be to notify to China that she was perfectly free to deal with opium as she pleased, it could not meet the whole case. If we did so notify China, and continued to grow the poppy ourselves, we should simply encourage smuggling, and China has too large a seaboard not to make smuggling a tempting venture. No ; there is only one right thing to do, and that is to cease ourselves to culti- vate the poppy. China's View of the Opium Traffic, Past and Present. 4. There was a time when the people of China sincerely endeavoured to rid themselves of the evil. We have THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 31 turned a deaf ear to their cry. Why ? Because we are strong, and they are weak. Should not that fact fire the hearts of Christian men and women in this country? Are we going to bind this wrong on the Chinese people, because they have not the strength to free themselves ? Would we do it in Germany or France ? Never ! China may not be so earnest about the matter as she was. No wonder if she is not. But as we have coerced her in the past, we should now do all in our power to help her to be free. France, China, and the Opium Traffic. 5. As the Chinese emigrate largely, wherever they go, in the Straits about Singapore, and in the South Sea Islands, they carry the vice. According to a recent issue of L'Eglise Libre, of Paris, the French colony of Tahiti has become in- fected, and the ravages have been terrible both there and in the Marquesas Islands. There have been various edicts forbidding the trade, but smuggling is only too easy, and the natives seem unable to resist the deadly influence of the drug. The French Government, however, has now absolutely prohibited the introduction of opium. Surely we will not allow France to put England to shame. Russia, China, and the Opium Traffic. 6. Russia, in the Kuldja Treaty, inserts a prohibition of opium clause, thus securing a freedom of trade with China in honest commerce unknown between England and China. Ingress and egress from the Russian borders of China is perfectly free, whilst English trafific from the British Burmah border of China is rigidly barred. The opium policy of the English Government is as commercially foolish as it is politi- cally wicked. 32 england's greatest national sin. Opium is Injurious to all Classes. 7- The opium plague does not discriminate as to class. The worst wrecks, perhaps, are seen among the poor, whose penury leads them to smoke a compound composed largely of the ashes of the first smoking of opium, a preparation said to be more poisonous than the unmixed drug. The pestilence finds its victims in all grades. A Chinese gentle- man of good social position, in telling me at Canton that the opium habit was the greatest evil that had ever fallen upon China, said that of the sixteen of his father's family, eleven were addicted to the habit. Few things in Chinese history are more pathetic than the experience of the Emperor Tao Kwang. Three of his sons had died through the opium habit ; and finding the curse stealthily spreading among his subjects, he ordered Commissioner Lin to proceed to Canton in 1839 to stop the smuggling of opium into China. The monarch wept as, recounting the dire effects of the drug, he sent forth Commissioner Lin on his momentous mission. Then followed, in the interests of rapacious and criminal greed, and in defiance of the elementary principles of morality, one of the blackest pages in the history of Britain's dealings with other nations— the first opium war. The Emperor died, while the plague which had laid waste his own family was still forced upon his people at the point of British bayonets. China's greatest living statesman, Li Hung Chang, said in 1881, in reference to China's consent to legalize the opium traffic, having endured two wars and paid vast ' indemnities ' to Great Britain, that the legalization of the traffic was ' not from choice, but because China submitted to the adverse decision of arms. Notwithstanding the audacious charges of insincerity made by some Englishmen, I record my belief, the outcome of information from high sources, that China's THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 33 leading statesmen detest the traffic. If their protests have grown less urgent, it is not, as is sometimes alleged by the partisans of the scourge, that their consciences have been bribed by the revenue derived from imported opium, but because they have feared that continued remonstrance might bririg a recurrence of the calamities which attended former protests. Effective action to put down the native growth is impossible until the foreign import is stopped. Do my country-people, do the home Churches, realize that the action of the Chinese Government is paralyzed against the curse which is ravaging, impoverishing, demoralizing, and, as sure as the eternal law of cause and effect, tending to the break-up of their nation, because of the shadow of the black and brutal hand of British power, already gory with injustice, which they fear again to offend ? Who first introduced Opium into Chin.\ ? 8. We did not introduce opium-smoking, nor were we the first traders in opium. Nearly all the Europeans trading in the Straits took opium in the first place to China. The Chinese themselves were the first to bring opium-smoking to China, and we are indebted for opium-smoking to the island of Java. It came over from India to Java, to the place which is at present called Batavia. It was brought to two prefectures in the South-east of China. It was taken over from there to Formosa, and the aborigines began to smoke, mixing tobacco with the opium. It went on to 1780, and then in the first year of this century there was a very strong edict against it. I have copies of all these edicts from the_ Government in the native language. Then it went on until the eventful year 1839, the terrible year which was the beginning of the opium war in the time of the present Emperor's grandfather. His name was Tung 3 34 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. Kwo, meaning ' Reason's Glory,' or ' the Glory of Reason.' He sent Commissioner Lin to Canton, to put a stop to this trade. There had been a little native growth springing up in Yunnan, a south-western province close upon India. That is the first native growth we have, and that was about the year 1830, but this was abolished. The Emperor sent Commissioner Lin to Canton, and he went there determined to uproot the whole business, and when he arrived the opium ships were lying off the port. He demanded the whole of the opium-chests to be delivered up to him — more than twenty thousand chests. He set his men to work digging trenches, and emptying the opium into these trenches. They mixed it with quicklime and destroyed it. A MOST Pathetic Fact. 9. You cannot go down a street in a Chinese town but you see, spread across the street, advertisements of medicines to help people to break off the habit. Once the Governor of Shan-si opened refuges and forced soldiers and others in the Government employ to go into them. They broke off the habit as long as they were in the refuges, and they took to it again as soon as they went out. Another Governor went into the field, and took his soldiers and beat down the poppy. The people came out and said, ' Kill us. You might as well kill us as destroy our produce ;' so that they were utterly unable to deliver themselves from this curse. While they are grappling with it we keep on sending them the Indian opium. A missionary preaching in the streets of Shanghai said, ' There is a hell for those who do wrong.' A respectable Chinaman stepped forward, and said, with a very grave voice, ' It is perfectly true. There is a hell, and China has been a hell since you foreigners came here.' THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 35 And that testimony is about true. It is an inconceivable curse. The Chefoo Convention. 10. Allusion has been made to our unjustifiable wars with China. The last transaction in the matter of opium between us remains to be noticed, viz., the Chefoo Con- vention. For nine years the British Government refused to ratify it, although agreed to by their own Plenipotentiary, as it was thought to be injurious to the Indian opium revenue, by decreasing the chances of smuggling, a crime at one time considered so great in this country that death was the penalty. This convention was signed in 1876, and con- tained a special agreement by which opium was deposited in bonded warehouses, liable both to a tariff duty and to the /iAln (i.e., internal taxation) of the port, to be collected by the Customs, while the provincial governments were left free as to the amount of Nkin to be collected upon its transit through their jurisdictions. Subsequently an ' additional article ' made the /iki'ii a uniform tax, thus depriving the provincial authorities of the power to protect themselves against the drug. The Testimony of Mis.signaries. 1 1. The missionaries of China are absolutely one on this important question. Can you point out any other question in which they are equally agreed? They are men of different nationalities and training ; they hold various creeds ; they are apt to look at questions from widely different standpoints ; they are men not living on the sea- coast only, but in inland places. There are some of them young, and others have grown gray in the work, having out- lasted two or three relays of Legation officials, and yet the 3—2 36 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. whole 600 of them with one accordant voice pro- claim the opium a curse, and they tell j'ou that the trade in the past was a monstrous wrong, and that it is still a gigantic evil. Such testimony, I think, ought to be con- sidered. Is there any similar consensus of opinion in favour of opium ? Is there any class of men united to a man in pronouncing it entirely harmless ? If not, then this remarkable testimony of all the missionaries of China, from the beginning until now, ought to make an impression upon the minds of people. 12. The Venerable Archdeacon Moule, one of the oldest missionaries in China, speaking at the annual meeting of the Church Missionary Society, said : 'A Chinese statesman said to our Plenipotentiary not long ago : " Take away your opium, take awa)- your missionaries, and all causes of friction between us will be gone." Opium and missionaries — that is a pretty combination, that is a pleasant partnership. Call me fanatic if you please, call me ignoramus if you like, call me anything ; but I for one do thank God for the sounds in the air and the signs of the times that this most lamentable, this most humiliating, partnership between opium and missionaries is approaching dissolution.' 13.' 'To our mind, nothing is more clear than that the Chinese had both the rig/tt, the poicer, and the will to stamp out the use of opium in China at the time when they first came into collision \nth the power of England. We are fully convinced that but for England they would then have accomplished this ; and hence we feel that England is morally responsible for every ounce of opium now produced in China, as well as for that imported from abroad. This, it seems to us, cannot be too clearly asserted and recognised.' {Rev. J. Hudson Taylor, M.R.C.S., founder of the China Inland Mission \ THE PERNICIOUS TRAFFIC IN THIS DEADLY DRUG. 37 14. The Bishop of Victoria (Hong-Kong) says : ' I have been again and again stopped while preaching with the question, " Are you an Englishman ? Is not that the country that opium comes from ? Go back and stop it, and then we will talk about Christianity." ' A Bird's-eye View of our Dealing with China. 15. -We began by smuggling opium and by giving it away, at a time when smugglers in our own country were being shot, and hanged, and their bodies hung up in chains to the public view. We continued to force opium upon the Chinese by the two opium wars already referred to. At the present time the Chefoo Convention with its 'Additional Article ' is in force. By it anyone can obtain opium through- out the whole of the Chinese Empire at a uniform price. The imperial authority is unable to raise that price, and the local governments have absolutely no power whatever to do so over the area of their jurisdiction. We may agree with the doctrine of free trade, but we have no right to prevent the Chinese adopting the principle of protection against the importation of opium. Our war with America came about because the British Government wanted to impose a tea-tax on the American people against their will. It is now gener- ally conceded that America had a moral right to revolt under the circumstances. The Chinese have a very much greater cause to complain of our present dealings with them. The death-bed utterance of the Marquis Tseng, who drew up the ' Additional Article ' describes what China considers her relation to us, — ' We are not free.' CHAPTER V. OPIUM AND OTHER DEMORALIZING NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. How Opium is prepared, and its Immediate Effects WHEN SMOKED. I. Opium is the concrete juice of the poppy, and has been known from ancient times as a powerful narcotic. It is obtained by making incisions in the green capsules of the plant when nearly at maturity, from which it exudes as a milky juice that thickens in the heat of the sun into a brownish mass. This is scraped off the capsules, and first placed in a little pot, which is carried under the arm. When this is filled the contents are shifted to a shallow brass dish, which is kept for some time in a vertical position, that the vegetable moisture may drain away. These dishes must be stirred every day, that the opium may be dried equally, which will usually take three or four weeks. The opium is then placed in little earthen jars and taken to the Govern- ment ' go down,' where it is tested, weighed, and credited to the grower. The drug is then put in large quantities into huge vats and mixed together according to variety and value; and by a delicate process it is manufactured into the go/is or balls known in commerce. The drug thus prepared is sent to China, where it goes through several additional processes before it is ready for the pipe. This usually consists of a OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 39 tube of heavy wood fitted at the head with a cup, which serves to collect the residuum or ashes which are left after combustion. The opium-smoker always lies down, and, reclining on his couch, holds his pipe. A little opium about the size of a pea is put into the hole of the pipe and set on fire by a lamp, and the fume is inhaled at one whiff that none of it may be lost. When the pipe has burned out the dose is repeated. At the commencement of the smoking the smoker becomes loquacious, breaking out in silly merriment ; but this gradually yields to a vacant paleness and a shrinking of the features, as the quantity increases and the narcotic acts. A deep sleep supervenes of from half an hour to three or four hours' duration, in which the pulse becomes slower, softer, and smaller than before the debauch. This sleep, however, is not refreshing, but a general sinking of the . mental and bodily powers is experienced, and an active desire for more is speedily created. Temperate smokers endeavour to keep within bounds, and some who have strong constitutions and still stronger resolutions continue the use of the drug within these limits for many years without disastrous effects upon their health and spirits. But in the large majority of cases moderation is impossible, as there is perhaps no form of intemperance more seducing, and in most instances the system when habituated to the drug demands a constantly increasing dose. We know the drug opium in England under two names, viz., laudanum, which is a liquid form ; and morphine, a white powder : both are prepared from the poppy. How Sad is the Following Description of Three Stages in the Opium Indulgence! 2. First. Indulgence in the opium habit gradually weakens the body. The energies are lessened, the face 40 ENGLA^W^S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. appears withered and sallow, yellow like clay, and dry like reeds. The cold of winter and the heat of summer cannot be endured. Burdens cannot be borne, and walking is difficult. Although such men can move about, they are like the paralytic and the lame ; although still among the living, they are like the dead. Second. Indulgence in opium leads to habits of idleness and daintiness of appetite. Night is turned into day, and day into night ; and they know not the value of time, or the importance of attention to duty. Although weighty matters may be at hand, they are wilfully neglected for a few whififs of opium. They do not distinguish between what is suitable for the poor and the rich. They loathe coarse food, and crave dainties ; and when at last their property is wasted away, then do they realize that this is the bitter fruitage of the use of opium. Third. Those who indulge in opium, as a class, are vicious in heart, wicked in deed, evil in thought, impure in word, false and crafty in intercourse with others. What is still more to be deplored, the will to do right is lost, and although they deeply know the harmful effects of their opium habit, and may wish to leave it, they are unable to do so. Hence it is very difficult to lead this class to repent and turn to God. Although some may enter the Church, many do so from false motives, and the few true-hearted ones are weak and easily turn aside and fall. Opium requires to be administered very cautiously as a medicine. 3. To illustrate the extreme caution necessary in pre- scribing opium as a medicine, it is recorded, on page 115 of ' Bristol Methodism in John Wesley's Days,' that during an illness at the time of the Bristol Conference in 1783, one OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 41 grain and a half of opium was administered to him, which ' had the effect of producing complete and dangerous coma- tose,' from which he was with difficulty recovered. For every Opium-smoker several Persons suffer Grievous Evils. 4. The wife of an opium-smoker in China is touched in all the most vital points of her moral nature. When her husband begins to smoke, and as his smoking brings them down in the world and involves them in poverty and distress, she loses her self-respect, and the motherhood of the woman is very soon affected. This descent into poverty on the part of multitudes of opium-smokers leads, as many here know, to the sale of the children. One after another is sold, but whenever the first sale takes place it is that of a little girl. The girls will go first, and they are sold into a peculiar slavery that exists in China. When the girls have gone, the boys will be sold one after another, and all the while the heart of the mother is rent and torn to pieces as one after another of her children is sold away from her, and as they go into the hands of strangers and, in some instances, to a fate and a doom which her motherhood must tremble at. But there comes something even worse than this, because the woman herself in some instances — I fear in many — is also sold, and in some cases to a fate that I hardly dare mention. We have, then, this fact, that for every opium-smoker there are three or four individuals in the persons of the wives and mothers and of the children who suffer grievous evils — evils which are not temporary, but which do not cease until existence ceases, and which rack and distress the tenderest sensibilities of the human heart. 42 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. Can the Evils of Opium-smoking be exaggerated? 5- 573^- Q- Can the evils, physical, moral, commercial, and political, as respects individuals, families, and the nation at large, of indulgence in this vice be exaggerated ? A. I have no doubt that where there is a great amount of evil there is always a certain danger of exaggeration ; but looking to the universality of the belief among the Chinese, that whenever a man takes to smoking opium it will probably be the impoverishment and ruin of his family — a popular feeling which is universal both among those who are addicted to it, who always consider themselves as moral criminals, and amongst those who abstain from it, and are merely endeavouring to prevent its consumption — it is difiScult not to conclude that what we hear of it is essentially true, and that it is a source of impoverishment and ruin to families. 5746. Q. A former witness said that the Chinese them- selves all admit that the effects of opium-smoking are bad : does your experience bear that out as being their opinion ? A. I think it is universal; I think that the men who smoke opium look upon themselves as morally criminal. 5759. Q. I do not know whether you can tell us at all whether the state of the country was better in regard to prosperity and comfort, and that sort of thing, before this great consumption of opium ? A. It is very difficult to entertain any doubt on that point ; the Chinese before the century were certainly about the most temperate of races ; their food was chiefly vegetable food ; they had no stimulants except a mild tobacco and tea, and they seem to have been perfectly content with that ; I must say that my own impression is that they were infinitely better off without the opium.* * Evidence before House of Commons Committee on East India Finance, 1871. — Sir Rutherford Alcock, K.C.B. OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 43 Opium-eating and smoking. Which is the worst? 6. Where there is any difference of opinion on these points, that difference seems to be pretty equally divided. Some say that opium-smoking is the worst, because they think that the morphine and other powerful narcotic elements of the opium come more quickly into contact with the blood and nerve centres through the lungs, than through the linings of the alimentary canal. Others say that opium- eating is the worst, because the whole of the narcotic elements are absorbed in the digestive tract, whereas a certain amount of these elements is exhaled by the opium- smoker, or remains in the ashes of the pipe. There are medical men of considerable weight and experience on both sides of the question. The probability is that one form of the vice is as bad as the other. Certainly an opium-eating workman is as much ' smoke to the eyes ' of his employer as an opium-smoker. 7. Miss Nainby, from India, remarked that in India opium is more eaten than smoked. In many of the zenanas which she had visited it was given to babies. ' I should die with- out opium !' exclaimed one poor woman, who was a complete wreck from it. Opium is easy to suppress. 8. There is no narcotic or intoxicating drug which ap- proaches English opium in virulence. At the same time there is no narcotic or intoxicating drug that is more easily suppressed. It takes two square yards of the best land to produce one tola of opium. A field of poppies, 10,920 square yards in extent, is necessary for the production of one single box of opium. In the clear Indian atmosphere a person standing on the hillside could see such a field forty 44 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. miles distant on the plains — or eighty miles, with a good field-glass. International treaties could very easily be arranged suppressing the growth of the poppy throughout Asia. iMeanwhile the total suppression of the virulent Indian drug is an immediate necessity. 9. There are numerous forms of opium adulteration, and the ashes of one smoking of opium are smoked and re- smoked. The quantity of opium, therefore, upon which duty is paid, is not an adequate gauge of the extent of the vice. Ganja. 10. The attention of the British public ought to be directed to the use of this intoxicating drug. Fourteen years ago, the Superintendent of the Calcutta Lunatic Asylum drew my attention to 100 men all standing together, and said, ' Every one of those is here through smoking ganja.' At the present time, in the Berhampore Asylum, there are fifty-one inmates from the same cause, and an average of twelve enter every year. One very painful case has been before me some years. A strong, intelligent lad, at Azimgunj, always used to bring milk to the boat during my stay. He afterwards got work on the railway ; but in a short time his mind was violently affected, and they were obliged to send him to the asylum here. He recovered, however, and resumed work. But about six months ago he again went wrong, and the first notice I had of it was his mad presence at our preaching station, when we were itinerating at Azimgunj. He was again put in the asylum, but recovered again last December, and has gone back home. In my ignorance I had always attributed his sad affliction to natural causes, but my inquiries during the last few days have revealed the fact that he is another victim OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 45 of oan/a-smoking. The habit thus formed will probably blight his whole life. During 1888-89, i" 'his district, 7,520 lb. of gauja were consumed, to say nothing of siddhi and charas. All these articles are products of the hemp plant, and can only be purchased by licensed shopkeepers from Gover/imefit store- houses. The tax on two qualities of ganja is about 9s. and 1 2 s. respectively for 2 lb. weight. Yesterday one shopkeeper had just bought 12 lb. from the magistrate's office, and he showed me the Government pass. This widespread habit of ^fa«/a-smoking has a most hurtful effect upon thousands, weakening their brain-power, undermining their health, eat- ing up their scanty earnings, and bringing ruin upon their families. The Effects of Ganja. II. There is a higher percentage of lunatics in the asylums of India from the use of ganja than from any other cause. Its effects are inexpressibly vile. In an important Government document upon the subject (' Report on the Cultivation of, and Trade in, Ganja in Bengal') facts terrible in their character are given. Its use originated, apparently, in ancient Egypt, where it was stringently prohibited by Napoleon Bonaparte during his occupation, and is, I believe, prohibited by the present Egyptian and Turkish Governments. In India it is used in the infernal Phallic worship of Shiva, and a heavy revenue obtained by the Government from its license. Mukrizi, an authority quoted on page 5 of the aforesaid Government document, calls the drug ' ordure revoltante,' and further says, ' L'usage de cette drogue produit des inclinations basses, et avilit I'ame. Nous avons toujours observe ceux qui en avoient contracte I'habitude, et nous avons remarque constamment que toutes -leurs inclinations naturelles se ddgradoient, et que leurs 46 ENGLAhWS GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. facultes alloient en diminuant de plus en plus, en sorte qu'a la fin il ne leur restoit plus, pour ainsi dire, aucun des attri- buts de I'humanite.' Ganja easy to suppress. Like the suppression of the growth of the poppy, the sup- pression of the growth of gnnj'a is exceedingly easy. Ganja is an unnatural production of the Indian hemp plant, pro- duced by cutting off the pollen-bearing branches, a process which results in the formation of an exceedingly poisonous and intoxicating resin on the seed-bearing branches. The plant grows to a height of from five to six feet, and, like a city set on a hill, cannot be hid. The hemp plant is not used at all for its legitimate purpose in India, jute being grown in its place. Charas is the most powerful form of the hemp poison. It is, practically speaking, essence of ganja, being the narcotic resin of the plant. The consumption is fearful in the Punjab, being no less than 2,851,120 tolas. I doubt if there is any other part of India where such an enormous quantity is used. The total quantity of all kinds of preparations from the Indian hemp, sold under Government license, in the Punjab is 16,500,000 tolas. A Digression — some American Cigarettes are heavily IMPREGNATED WITH OpIUM. 12. Millions of American cigarettes are sold and used to- day which are heavily impregnated with opium. Exhaustive chemical analyses by skilful chemists, acting under the auspices of the Women's Christian Temperance Union of America, have proved this. Thousands of our youth are OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 47 being unconsciously trained into the use of opium to-day by cigarette-sellers, who wish a taste for their cigarettes to be inculcated to the exclusion of all others. An earnest Chris- tian worker, to whom I was narrating these facts a short time ago, in the midst of my remarks lifted his hands in amaze- ment, and exclaimed, ' Then that is why it is that, whilst I have got many young converts to give up their pipe, so many of them find it difficult to give up the use of cigarettes ; they are not only slaves to the tobacco-habit, but are also in the grasp of the opium-fiend.' An article has been published in Invention (London, August 15th), from the pen of Dr. Keeley. Speaking of these opium-impregnated cigarettes, he says : ' It is the duty of every family physician to explain to those over whose health he has the supervision, the evil consequences of their use ; and it ought to be the duty of the secular and religious press to denounce their use at every oppor- tunity.' Facts corroborative of these statements are found in ' Wyman's Commercial Encyclopaedia.' On page 120 of that work it is stated that the import of opium for the year is 488,241 lb. Taking a half-grain opium pill as the legiti- mate medical dose for an adult, and one-twentieth of a grain for an infant, averaging these doses, and comparing them with the population of the United States according to the 1890 census, we find that this quantity, so divided, would give 181 medical doses to every man, woman, and child. As a large proportion of the people never touch opium as a medicine from one year's end to another, these figures show an enormous vicious use of the drug, only to be accounted for by its use in quack medicines and in the afore-mentioned cigarettes. There are 6,376 apothecaries' grains in one pound of opium; 1,000 lb. of opium would give one grain each to nearly 6,500,000 cigarettes. 48 england's greatest national sin. Another Phase ok the Opiuji Vice. 13. The evidence of the venerable Rao Bahadur* Gopalrao Hari Deshmuk, as a personal witness of the deterioration of the Rajpoots through opium, is especially valuable. He said : 'The British Parliament has decided that the opium-trade is immoral, and therefore it should be prohibited. Opium-eating is very bad. I was in Malwa for some time. Poppy plants grow there in abundance. Juice is drawn from them, and it is put in water. This water is then called kusumba. It is drunk by the princes, the chiefs, and the peasantry, and it is thought disrespectful to refuse drinking it. ^Vhen friends are invited, kusumba is the first thing that is offered to them. They become sleepy and idle. Thus the whole nation of Rajpoots, which was once a nation of great warriors who fought great battles with the Moghuls in the time of Akbar, has now become quite useless in intellect and power. The process of drinking kusumba commences in the morning at seven o'clock, when the pots are adjusted and the opium is put in the straining instrument, and some water is put along with it, and the water is allowed to drop below in a pot. This water is offered to friends around, and some sweetmeat is eaten after it. This goes on up to ten o'clock, when they go to take their dinner. After dinner they sleep till four, and the morning process of kusumba again goes on. This continues about two hours, when they go for a walk. Thus the whole day is spent in kusumba and sleeping. The chiefs are quite unable to do any work. They are assisted by viliatees (i.e., Afghan adventurers). Each chief has a viliatee for a manager. I have asked some of the chiefs why they are under the thumb of viliatees. They say that they are unable * ' Rao Bahadur' is a title somewhat correspondiDg to our ' Sir.' OPIUM AND OTHER NARCOTICS SOLD IN INDIA. 49 to work and realize revenue from Bheels and other turbu- lent tribes. They cannot do without the assistance of a viliatee. This vice is very prevalent in Rajputana, Malwa, and Kattyawar, and to some less extent in Guzerath. I have seen many victims of this vice. They become quite paralyzed, and lose taste utterly. When these people are ill with dysentery it goes very hard with them ; for opium has no effect on their constitution. The whole nation of Rajputs has become quite womanish by this vice. The question is whether this ought to be allowed to go on or it ought to be stopped.' CHAPTER VI. ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED. Is Opium worse than Alcohol? I. There are western vices that are strong and terrible ; but the opium habit is the most imperious and relentless under which humanity can fall. An illustration of this is found in the remark of a chief justice of one of India's most important provinces, who recently said, ' It was quite a common thing for the whole proceedings of his court to be stopped because a witness became confused, and the interpreter would say to him, " Sahib, the witness must have his opium, or he cannot go on ;" and the whole court would have to be adjourned while the witness went out somewhere to smoke his pipe of opium.' 2. However bad the drink traffic is in its effects, the opium trade is still worse. Opium is more insidious in its power than alcohol, and the opium habit harder far to shake off than the habit of indulging in strong drink. Many a drunkard only drinks to excess occasionally, whereas the victim of the opium indulges in it daily. It exercises for him an uncontrollable power and fascination. These are the words of a victim to the habit : 'Writhing, throbbing, palpitating, shattered,' says the famous De Quincey, referring to it, ' nothing is too mean or corrupt for him to attempt in order to allay the craving which ALCOHOL AXD OPIUM COMPARED. 51 he feels. To satisfy that craving he will part with property, furniture, clothes. He will ruin his parents, or sell his wife and children. When too impoverished to buy his opium he will beg it, and use the scrapings of other men's pipes ; and when unable to get these he will droop and die by the roadside, to be buried at the expense of the charitable.' Three Affirmative Answers to the Foregoing Question. 3. Answer 1. Twenty cases of opium, as supplied from the Government factories at Patna, would put to death every man, woman, and child in London and its suburbs.* Twenty thousand cases of gin would not put to death the population of London. It is admitted that the alcohol question is a great and important one, but the opium question is stupen- dously greater. Answer 2. There is an infinitely stronger conscience against the use of opium in Asia than against the use of alcohol in England ; opium-smoking in India is a secret vice. The shops are so hidden that it would be possible, in many cases, to pass near them for years without knowing of their existence. The consciences of the people are outraged to a much greater degree by the licensing of opium than by that of alcohol. In Madras and other places, the raw opium shops sell other goods as ' a blind,' so that passers-by shall not know that the customers are purchasing opium. Answer 3. The Government is far more directly involved in the opium trade in India than in the alcohol trade in England, The police courts in India are, in a large number of cases, the wholesale stores for opium ; the Government stores of opium and of rupees being often guarded by the * Twenty chests of India opium contain nearly i8,coo,ooo of grains, Apothecaries' weight, four grains being a fatal do^e. 4—2 52 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. same soldiers. The Government is also the manufacturer of the opium to a large extent in its own factories. It is also the manager, or overlord, of many of the cultivators, suppljang them with seed and cash when necessary. Dr. Maxwell on the Physiological Effect of Opium. 4. Opium has not the effect of bringing about immediately rapid degeneration. It begins its work, but it carries it on slowly ; and if people are in a condition of plenty, so that they can have abundance of food, and can drink stimulants, the fact of their being opium-eaters or opium-smokers is not so quickly perceived as if they were working men. With the working man it is perceived comparatively quickly ; and as he earns only, perhaps, two hundred cash a day, amounting to about eightpence, he spends, perhaps, a half or, in the first instance, a third of that sum upon opium. The moment that he is put into any straits, he cannot give up his opium, and, on the other hand, his wagesare diminished, and at once he is in difficulties. These difficulties show themselves, first, partly on his family and partly on himself. He goes down much more quickly just because of tliese little difficulties, and in a short time you recognise in the case of a working man that he is a pronounced opium- smoker. You see it on his face by its emaciation, and by the colour of it, and by the other marks which are always recognised in an opium-smoker. But even a working man may go on for years and years as an opium-smoker. On the other hand, you have to remember this : that we are guided, as missionaries, very largely by the Chinese themselves. The Chinese say that the moral character of a Chinaman who begins to take opium is broken. We are guided by the Chinese in this — that we can admit no opium-smokers into ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COM-PARED. 5 J the Church because our Chinese brethren will not allow it. They say, ' You are doing wrong if you admit an opium- smoker into the Church. He has taken upon himself a habit which inevitably blinds his moral perception.' Now, that, by itself, is about the strongest thing concerning opium that can be said. We should not dare to say that with regard to alcohol. Some of us hold very strong views with regard to the effect of alcohol, but we should not like to go the length of saying that, in the forms in which it is taken in this country, it necessarily blinds the moral and spiritual perceptions of men. But it is the conviction of the Chinese themselves that to begin to smoke opium is to begin a habit which at once blinds the moral perception, so that, ' our enemies themselves being judges,' those of our countrymen, such as her Majesty's consuls, who have been forward in the defence of the opium, say, ' Never engage a servant who smokes opium. He is not to be trusted.' Those are their own words. On the other hand, I should like to say that, in the case of the wealthier people, they may go on for twenty or thirty years, and still present a comparatively fair appearance. I must say that as a medical man, and that should be understood ; whilst, on the other hand, in the case of a working man there is a comparatively rapid descent The Testimony of Missionaries. 5. The Rev. S. Whitehead, who has laboured among the Chinese for ten years, said : 'I could easily detect the opium inebriate in the congregation, and very often pointed him out, and he was compelled to confess me correct. Hollow eyes, sunken cheeks, high shoulder-bones, emaciated frame, discoloured teeth, sallow complexion, are the signs which announce the opium-smoker everywhere. And the evils thus set forth have their correspondence in the mental and 54 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. moral degradation of the people. A smoker needs some three hours a day to consume the opium that is requisite for him. He is unable to do more than two hours' consecutive work because he must have his opium, and when he needs it, whatever he may be doing, he must and will have it. If he has not time to take his rice and his opium, then he will smoke his opium. If he has not money enough to buy both rice and opium, he will spend his last cash on opium. If he has no money left, he will pawn his garments. If he has already pawned his garments, then he will steal. By one means or another he must have it. If he is deprived of it too long, water flows from the eyes, he experiences a burn- ing in the throat, and a dizziness in the head, and coldness in the extremities. If he is altogether denied the use of opium, he will die, and in agony. It is obvious the wife and family of such a man must be reduced to destitution, and that life-long misery must be the result. Worse still, the daughters must be sold into slavery or into shame in order to procure the money requisite to stave off hunger.' 6. The Rev. F. W. Bailer, of the China Inland Mission, who has lived in China seventeen years, and has travelled in thirteen out of the eighteen states of that great empire, said at a meeting held in December, 1 88g : ' That he had mixed with the highest and the lowest, but he had never met with a single native who looked upon opium-smoking as a bless- ing. Opium was a very different thing to alcohol. The drunken man reeled about, but the opium-smoker showed no signs of it. Another difference was that the drunkard was ashamed of himself, and did not touch drink for a week or two again, but the opium-smoker cannot exist without it after he has once formed the habit.' 7. ' I believe that there are many who at first take the opium only occasionaly, but I believe also, from what I ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED. 55 have seen, that the tendency towards the habitual use of it is incomparably greater than the tendency to become an habitual user of alcohol A man can take a little alcohol, such as a glass of wine occasionally at his dinner, without anyone supposing that he is likely to become a drunkard on that account. At least, many do it. But if a Chinaman takes opium oftener than a few times, such is the insidious- ness of it, that in a short space of time he is all but certain to acquire the habit. And that is the point in which it is specially worse than alcohol.' {Dr. W. Gauld, sixteen years medical missionary in China.) The Public-house and the Opium-den compared. 8. From the following description of opium-dens, it is evident that they are by far more objectionable resorts than our very worst public-houses or gin-palaces. This we can prove from the testimony of eye-witnesses. g. The following extract from a letter from Mr. W. S. Caine, M.P., dated Lucknow, December 23, 1888, describes his visit to two opium-dens in that city : ' For the first time in my life I am within the walls of an opium-den. At the entrance sits a comely Chinese woman, whose husband is busy showing the arriving customers into the least crowded of the side rooms. Before her is a table, covered with copper coins. She is veritably " sitting at the receipt of custom." About half of these copper coins go to the Government treasury at Calcutta, the other half going to the Government tax- collector, the opium farmer. I obtain permission to go over the whole premises, and enter the first of the small rooms. In the centre of the room, which has no window, and is very dark, is a small charcoal fire, whose glow casts a lurid light on the faces of nine human beings, men and women, lying in a circle like pigs in a sty. A young girl 56 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. about fifteen years of age has charge of each room, fans the fire, lights the opium-pipe, and holds it to the mouth of the smoker who has last come in, till his head falls heavily on the body of his predecessor. Two or three are in various stages of preliminary drunkenness. I have been in East- end gin-palaces on Saturday nights ; I have seen men in various stages of delirium tremens ; I have visited many idiot and lunatic asylums ; but I have never seen such horrible destruction of God's image in the face of man as I saw in the " Government " opium-dens of Lucknow. To my dying day I shall carry the recollection of the face of a handsome young woman of eighteen or nineteen years sprawling on the senseless bodies of men, her fine brown eyes flattened and dulled with coming stupor, and her lips drawn back from her glittering white teeth. Another girl of the same age was sitting in a group of newly-arrived smokers, singing some lewd romance as they handed round the pipe. I went from room to room, and counted 97 persons of both sexes in various stages of opium stupor. Green hands could get drunk for a penny or less, but by degrees more and more opium is needed, and the callous keeper of this hideous den showed us men whom 180 drops of thick opium, mixed with tobacco, hardly sufficed to intoxicate. I came out staggering and faint with the poison-laden atmosphere. 'After a few minutes' walk my guide said, "Here is another opium shop ; will you go in ?" I could not believe there was more than one such abomination in Lucknow, and mastering my disgust, I entered a second. It was even worse, and more squalidly beastly than the first. Again I went from room to room, and counted on the ground-floor alone 117 human swine of both sexes, noticing among them a bonny little lad of six or seven watching his father's changing face with a dreadful indifference. Having counted ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED. 57 117,1 was asked to go upstairs, where there were many more customers ; I had had even more than my strong stomach could stand, but I was told that there would probably be 50 more. ' It was three in the afternoon when I visited these places, and I am told that after dark the attendance is doubled. I have felt the effects of the fumes ever since, and the slight headache produced will probably last for two or three days.' 10. The following is a condensed description of two opium-dens visited in 1889 by Dr. Morison, a missionary of the Presbyterian Church of Rampore Beauleah, Bengal : ' I stepped into a den and found twelve men sitting down to their pipes ; most of them had sallow complexions, and one in the last stage of emaciation. I found none of them will- ing that these dens should be extended. " Only let us die first ; for if you deprive us of it suddenly we must die." "Ah," said the shopkeeper, "don't think the Maharanee (the Queen) will close these shops; she gets too much money out of these opium, ganja, and liquor shops to think of closing them." I replied, " Not so : if the good Maha- ranee and the good people of England knew that these shops are demoralizing and destroying the [people of this country, they would shut them, and deliver you from temptation." ' My next visit was to another den, a quarter of a mile distant. I counted fifteen at their pipes. What shocked me here more than in the previous den was to find that the majority were young men under twenty-five years of age. The lad in charge of the shop was a youth of eighteen or nineteen, pale and thin, with brilliantly black eyes — char- acteristic of the opium-smoker when under its influence. I asked him how he came to be there ; he said he was serving in charge of the shop, and received so much per day 58 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. — I think he said four annas — of which he smoked the half, and the other half went to purchase food. The next man, who was in the act of smoking, told me he too was serving in the shop, and that if he smoked the value of twopence per day, he had only twopence to give to his father and mother for food. Here were two young men in one shop, bound slaves by the fascinating drug.' I will quote no more from the missionary except these words, ' But I had not seen all yet.' II. Mr. Maurice Gregory, one of the editors of the Banner of Asia, Bombay, visited Allahabad, the seat of the Government of the North-West Provinces of India, in July, 1889. I will give his statement somewhat condensed: ' On July 30th, in the evening, I went with an earnest native Christian to an opium-shop where the chandool (liquid opium) was sold ready for use.' He then describes some filthy little black dens, with only the door, and no window, in wh ch hardly anything could be discerned but the flickering gleam of the opium-lamp (used in lighting the pipes). ' In each of the sheds there were several groups, 'ach round a lamp. There were eighteen groups altogether dens and sheds. Very few of the smokers had any clothes on except their loin-cloths, and they looked pauperized, emaciated and starved. There were also women present, inmates of houses of ill fame, loaded with jewellery, and smoking with the men. There were about 150 altogether, and people were coming and going all the time- Before we had been there long, my native Christian companion was asked, referring to myself, " Is this your Padri Sahib ?" (the vernacular term for missionary). My com- panion replied, " No, he is only a Sahib." He continued, "Brethren, does not your conscience condemn you ?" They said, "Oh yes! God does not like this. Surely we have ruined ourselves. We are good for nothing." We then ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED. 59 said, " Surely we love you, and our desire is to save you from this evil." On this an intensely earnest look came on their faces, all in the group we were conversing with rose up, several others joined them, they all eagerly conversed with each other, and then they said to my native companion, "Please tell Sahib to write to the Queen to stop this. If Sahib will write, surely she will stop it. We are become destitute. Some of us were rich people." ' Dens for Gooi.i-smoking. 12. In answer to a letter of inquiry, the Rev. W. B. Phillips, of Berhampore, Bengal, writes to the London Missionary Society, and thus describes his visit to a den confined to gooli-smoking. On his entrance twelve were present. On the floor was a plate of thick, pasty-looking sweetmeat. ' What is that for ?' he asked. A mason, deeply engrossed in ^^^//-smoking, looked up and replied, ' That is to take along with the gao/t, so as to help on ntoxication.' GooU is a compound of fried guava-leaves and opium. The man put a little into the hand of Mr. Phillips. It looked like a mass of minute charcoal shavings cemented together. He then broke off a piece, and rolled it into a little ball, the size of a pill. This pill he put at the top of a small, hollow, earthenware cone, which was fitted on to his hookah (pipe). The hookah was fitted into the neck of a broken earthen vessel ; with a small pair of bamboo tongs, he then applied a little cake of glowing prepared charcoal to his gooli till he had smoked it all away. Mr. Phillips remarks, ' It made me sad to think of the certain consequences of his vile habit.' Some of these men will smoke thirty-six or forty-eight goalies at a sitting, which means an outlay equal to the whole day's earnings of most labourers. 6o ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. Even Little Children are Drugged in Chinese AND Licensed Indian Opium-dens. 13. Chinese Christians are unanimous in their condem- nation of opium. I have heard the expression of their feelings in large gatherings. No opium-taker can be admitted into Church membership; but many members, alas ! have had to be disowned on account of falling or relapsing into the vice, including some of the most prominent and promising ordained native preachers. If the opium habit is so relentlessly cruel when con- tracted in mature years, let Christian parents who read these lines consider what it must be when acquired in childhood. It is not an uncommon sight in a Chinese opium-den to see a mother smoking opium, with her baby propped up beside her. But nearer home than China, namely, in licensed opium-dens in the commercial capital of India, I have seen little children, from three years old upwards, l>'ing in a comatose state from opium, grown, manufactured, and sold under the auspices of the British Government. Oh, the hell within, against which the adult of such a childhood has to struggle ! As I have gazed upon little children in Indian and Chinese opium-dens, their lives thus damned for the sake of bringing a blood revenue into the British-Indian e.xchequer, I have thought of the day when He who once said, 'Suffer little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not,' will sit upon His throne of judgment In that day the mouth of every implicated British administrator, legislator, and opium merchant, and of their apologists, will be stopped. They will call upon the mountains and rocks to fall upon them and hide them. But well will it be in that great day of revealing and judgment for those of unseared and pitying heart who dare in this crisis to place the value of souls above the revenue from their destruction. ALCOHOL AND OPIUM COMPARED. 6i English Men and Women are to be found in Melbourne Opium-dens. The following is from the Deliverer, commencing in the middle of the narrative. 14. 'It would be quite impossible to describe the filthy, wretched condition of this den or the ghastly appearance of its victims. ' Our guide, in speaking to one, mentioned that this was the last time he should see them, as he was about to leave for England, At the sound of the last word, a figure that had lain perfectly motionless on its wretched resting-place slowly arose, and extended an emaciated hand. ' I could not prevent an exclamation of horror, for instead of being a Chinaman, as we had supposed, he was a fine- looking young Englishman. On his pale face he still bore traces of refinement and culture. The sound of that single word, " England," had evidently awakened sweet memories of home and bygone days. He shook the Colonel by the hand, and, without a word, fell back and again relapsed into stupor. ' When we left the place, I staggered with faintness, by reason of the poison-laden atmosphere. 'We visited fully a score of these dens — some even more repulsive than the one I have described. In one was a most lovely young girl ; she could not have been more than eighteen. When we entered, the opium-pipe lay by her side, having evidently just been used. She was reclining on a bed, intensely wretched, but still not so bad as some we had seen. Her lips were drawn back from her glittering white teeth, and coming stupor was creeping over her. By her side was another young girl in the same condition. ' Both were too much stupefied to understand what we said. 02 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. ' At last, as we were about to leave, our friend, who knew the one on the bed, said : ' " Well, Maggie, good-bj'e ; I have pleaded with you often to leave this life, and now I am going away to England, and shall never see you again on earth, but I want you to meet me in heaven !" ' Maggie opened her eyes, and gazing vacantly at him for a moment, suddenly seemed to comprehend his meaning. With a despairing groan, she managed to sit up, and ex- tending both hands, cried out in tones that pierced our very hearts : ' " Oh, Colonel ! Colonel ! if you should go to Man- chester'' (mentioning a certain address), "and see my mother, will you tell her I'm living in Melbourne? Don't, for God's sake ! say I'm in a Chinaman's den." ' The power of opium again prostrated her, and she fell back insensible.' CHAPTER VII. THE OPIUM TRADE FROM A RELIGIOUS POINT OF VIEW. The Great Responsibility of all Christians, to HELP PUT DOWN THIS MoNSTER EviL. I. God has been long-suffering indeed in not visiting our sin upon us as a nation ; but perhaps this is because the people have been ignorant of the evil, and not been in- telligent partakers or actors in what has been done. Ignor- ance cannot continue, however, and if the nation, nominally Christian, does not rise to the opportunity in all the strength of righteous resolve, and break off the iniquity, the terrible judgments which are visited upon national wrong- doing must come upon us. In Great Britain, under the constitutional Government of to-day, the people are directly responsible for the deeds of their rulers. This responsibility is a glorious privilege, for Christian men and women can exercise their influence for God and righteousness to help the oppressed, and free those who are in terrible bond- age. The speaker (Sir Arthur Blackwood) pointed out that with the spread of information ignorance becomes culpable. Above all considerations which impressed him was the fact that the opium traffic has grossly degraded the glory of God in the eyes of the civilized world, and among the nations 64 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. over whom Britain has been permitted to rule. Next comes our proper interest in the bodily and spiritual welfare of those who have been so sadly wronged. He regarded it as an omen for good that God has allowed this move- ment to be undertaken, and has stirred up the hearts of his servants in England, and caused the cries from the native Churches in the East to reach us. Far as the evil has gone, and deep and widespread as has been its havoc, by God's grace the system may yet be abolished ; and though the terrible past cannot be undone, the plague may be stayed for the future. The nation that could emancipate the slaves of the West Indies will, when the people hear ' how the wickedness was done,' by the help of God, wash its hands of the sin of tempting men with opium for their physical and moral degradation and spiritual ruin. It is Useless to Ignore our Guilt. 2. ' The Americans thought their harvest was a few millions a year, extracted by the lash and secured by im- measurable crimes ; but the real harvest was the loss of a thousand millions of money, and a million of their most valuable lives, and many millions of bereaved fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, friends, and dependents of all kinds. This was their proper harvest. What they sowed they also reaped. Every drop of blood drawn by the lash was, as Lincoln said, paid for by a bucketful drawn by the sword. ' We thus learn that there is a God in heaven, a God who is not mocked. We have already reaped in famines, and mutiny, but assuredly all this is nothing to what is before us if, in the face of God's dealings with America and with our- selves, we persist in what is bringing utter destruction upon so many millions in China. THE OPIUM TRADE AND RELIGION. 65 ' Our shutting our own eyes to the wrong we are doing won't the least defer this harvest. All the subtle arguings about our need of the money, the supply of opium by other countries, the half - heartedness of the Chinese authorities, etc., won't affect the results a hair's-breadth. The question is between us and God. " Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap," without the smallest diminution in consequence of what others may do, even the Chinese themselves.' {Sir Arthur Cotton, K.C.S.I.) Opium and the Gospel in China. — Str.\nge Scene on A River-boat. 3. ' I was ascending the Yang-tse-Kiang River. As we passed the city of Nanking, two native Christians came on board and joined us. They were not in the pay of any mission, but were volunteers who had been assisting in the formation of a Christian Church, under very interesting circumstances, in a part of the country never visited by a missionary. These men were greatly cheered and encour- aged, and really to see their faces was as good as a sermon. They had not been long on board before a passenger asked one of them, who was a native doctor, where he was coming from, and what he had been engaged in. In reply he began to give an account of the work of Christ that he had witnessed and taken part in, and his own enthusiasm so communicated itself to the little company gathered around, that they were listening to the story of the Cross, and of the Saviour who came from heaven to die for sinners, with a degree of interest that one does not often see in China. 'I sat at a little distance looking on with thankfulness, and raising my heart to God for His blessing, for I saw that fully a third of the passengers were collected around our medical friend, listening -with interest to his story. 5 6S ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. ' One among the passengers attracted my eye. I saw that he was not so interested as those around him; and very soon impatience gave way to scorn and anger. With a look which I wish I could bring home to you, he said: "Ah, yes, and we are to think, I suppose, that the missionaries are our very good friends, are we?" "Yes," said the doctor, " indeed they are. They have come thousands of miles on purpose to benefit us, and to tell us of Christ that died for sinners." "And to bring lis the opiutn," said the man, "and to bring us t/ie opium /" * ' Oh, if I could make you witness of the scene it would satisfy you as to what is the conscience of China on the question. That sentence, and the intense scorn and anger with which it was uttered, penetrated every heart. I wished that I could sink through the floor out of sight. The little company, no longer interested, slunk away like men ashamed of themselves, as if they had been caught at something evil in listening to a doctrine which had been brought by those who bring the opium. It is worse than mockery to the Chinese to bring your opium, and then say to them, "Love your neighbour as yourself." ' {/. Hudson Taylor.) Chinese Christians and the Ravages of the Opium Plague. 4. Not only does the Chinese Christian have to bear the taunt of having adopted the religion of ' the foreign devils, who are making China into a hell by their opium,' but he has also the bitterness of seeing the little Christian Church decimated by the infernal drug. Whole families sometimes go back into heathenism under its influence. In other cases the wife and mother alone remains true, widowed and child- less while her husband and sons are yet alive, more bereaved * The inexpressibly awful term 'Jesus Opium' is beginning to be used by the Chinese. — Dr. Dudgeon, missionary, China. THE OPIUM TRADE AND RELIGION. 67 than if she had buried them. In some instances, the womanhood of the deserted wife is further outraged by having to witness her fallen husband's marriage with another. A month since,* at a meeting of the Christian Women's Anti- Opium and Temperance Union of Tien-tsin, the proceed- ings were broken by sobs and crying, as the Christian wives and mothers recited their experiences of the ravages of the opium fiend. Can we be surprised, then, at the depth of feeling in the native Church upon this monster evil? That Chinese Christians desire a war of extermination against opium is illustrated by the pledge of their Prohibition of Opium Society at Pekin and elsewhere. Its members ' promise to be faithful unto death,' not to eat, smoke, cultivate, nor help others to cultivate, nor to trade or assist others to trade in opium ; and ' with all my heart and strength to use every righteous method to destroy the evil and injury of opium- taking, and to exhort others to do likewise.' 5. Opium and the Gospel have come together from England, and the doubt arises and finds expression in words, that the Gospel is false. Your missionaries come with the real desire to benefit the people, but those who see them maliciously declare that opium and missionaries are alike English productions, and they -suspect the missionaries of secretly doing evil. Moreover, the Church opens free schools, and although they are meant to benefit the youth, yet it is impossible to stop the mouths of those who are not taught, while opium remains unforbidden. The Church has opened hospitals, but although they are saving men from disease, it is impossible to influence the hearts of ^hose who have not been healed, while opium remains unforbidden. Your Christians, with singleness of heart, are zealous in * April 14, 1890. s— 2 68 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. many works, but while opium remains, they are all like so much water poured out. It is said by some that Chinese are fond of opium, and the calamities they suffer are of their own making, and the English have nothing to do with it. The New Testament says : ' Have no fellowship with evil.' Now, when your Government plants and sells opium to minister to the evil propensities of the Chinese, you are partakers with them, and what can you say in excuse thereof? An Appeal from the Pekin Anti-Opium Society. 6. The Bible says : ' I will not eat anything that makes my brother sin.' How, then, can one covet such usury and so kill myriads of men ? We have from afar admired your noble country. Your benevolent heart has long been known far and near, how with all your might you stopped the slave trade. But is killing men by opium a less evil? Truly we fear it is a greater. Recently there was a famine in China. Your noble country generously sent assistance, and Chinamen proclaimed your benevolence. But some said : ' It were better not to receive your help and die, if only the deadly opium might be stopped, and be brought no more to our shores.' So it appears your noble country, because of opium, receives a bad name. Frequently men say of the missionaries : ' Your words exhort us to virtue, but your heart conceals poison, since you kill us with opium and carry our money to your own country.' Alas ! we cannot see you ; and pen and ink cannot paint the terrible reality. One man cannot move 10,000 lb., but one hundred men can. We ask you with united heart, pray for us, and with united strength stop the curse, cast out from China this giant evil, and prohibit the traffic. CHAPTER VIII. IMPORTANT TESTIMONIES. Great Ignorance is the Cause of much of the Prevailing Indifference on this Subject. I. 'I have such faith in the good feeling of my country- men that I believe that, if they could once realize what it is that we have done and are doing as regards opium, they would rise as one man, and get rid of this accursed thing.' (St'r Edward Fry.) 2. Sir Arthur Cotton, in a letter to the writer nearly nine years ago, wrote : ' A gentleman of property lately said to me, " Can you tell me anything about this opium question ? It appears to me it must be terribly wrong to make money by forcing this evil upon another nation." I am confident that this gentleman was only the representative of the great mass of the people of England, and that nothing is wanting but information to rouse the whole body of the nation, and to bring such a hurricane of public opinion upon the authorities as will sweep away every thought of attempting to continue this inconceivable national crime.' The Moral Law for Nations. 3. ' I believe there is no permanent greatness to a nation 70 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. except it is based upon morality. . . May I ask you, then, to believe, as I do most devoutly believe, that the moral law was not written for men alone in their individual character, but that it was written as well for nations, and for nations great as this of which we are citizens ? If nations reject and deride that moral law, there is a penalty which will inevitably follow. It may not come at once, it may not come in our lifetime ; but, rely upon it, the great Italian is not a poet only, but a prophet, when he says : ' The sword of Heaven is not in haste to smite, Nor yet doth linger. " The Principles for National Policy. ' We have not, as the chosen people of old had, the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night, to lead us through the wilderness of human passion and human error ; but He who vouchsafed the cloud and the fire has not left us forsaken. We have a guide not less sure, a light not less clear ; we have before us the great principles of justice and mercy which Christianity has taught us. . . . Let us trust these principles ; let us believe that they exist for ever unchangeably in the providence of God ; and if we build our national pohcy upon them we may rest assured that we shall do all that lies in our power to promote that which is good.' (TAe late John Bright, M.P.) 4. How affecting is the following testimony from the unhappy Coleridge — a testimony which he solemnly charged his friends to make public ! After a most harrow- ing description of his misery, he says : ' I used to think the text in St. James, that " he who offended in one point offends in all," very harsh ; but now I feel the awful, the tremendous truth of it. In the one crime of opium what crimes have I not made myself guilty of? Ingratitude to IMPORTANT TESTIMONIES. 71 my Maker ; to my benefactors injustice ; and unnatural cruelty to my poor children ; self-cotitempt for my repeated promise-breach, nay, too often, actual falsehood. After my death I earnestly entreat that a full and unqualified narration of my wretchedness, and of its guilty cause, may be made public, that at least some little good may be effected by the dreadful example.' Mr. S. Smith, M.P., on our Injustice to India. 5. Referring to the difficulties which had attended dealing with the question in Parliament, he said that China's silence at the present day is one. Our Government recently refused to order that opium in India shall be labelled ' poison,' as in England, and sold by chemists. He thought the first ground on which to attack the evil at present was thus to show the unequal and un-Christian way in which our fellow-subjects are being treated in India. It is within the power of the Indian Government to cancel every license and bring the traffic to a close ; and more than nine-tenths (perhaps ninety-nine one-hundredths) of the people would cordially support their action. In con- clusion, Mr. Smith said he thought the movement would entail in England a moral struggle nearly as great as that which the Americans went through when they abolished slavery. 6. The question had never been treated as a party one. Year after year the Indian Government declared that nothing could be done, because the revenue could not be spared, and for that revenue the Christianity of the United Kingdom was being disgraced. (Sir J. Pease, M.P.) 7. ' Oh, we would abolish this trade if we could, but then consider the revenue.' 'Words like those,' said the late Archbishop of York, ' have occurred in speeches, and even 72 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. in public documents put forth in this country. We, as Christian ministers, have nothing to do with that ; f/nntg/i the whole of the revenue in India., from end to end, depended entirely on the opium traffic, if it is a sinful afid wrong traffic we are bound to protest against it, and to seek other waj's in which revenue of some sort can be supphed.' Our Indian Finances and the Opium Indulgence. 8. ' We do not believe that one person in ten really knows what the opium scandal is : they know that there is some- thing or other not quite as it should be, but this is all. Our Indian finances are fed by our providing for the indulgence of one of the most degrading vices into which men can fall.' {Rev. C. H. Spurgeon.) We are told that Opium-smoking is not worse than Whisky-drinking. 9. ' We are often told, in this House and elsewhere, that though, no doubt, opium-smoking is a great evil, it is not worse than the gin and whisky drinking that prevails among ourselves. WeU, it need not be worse, and yet be bad enough. But what a strange argument to be used by a Christian nation, to say : " There is a habit among our- selves which, according to the concurrent testimony of ministers of religion, magistrates, judges, medical men — of all who are concerned in the administration of the law, or who are caring for the health and morals of the people — is the most prolific source of disease, crime, and misery, and what we force on the Chinese is not much worse than that ; and what right have they to complain?"' {T/ie late Mr. Henry Ricliard, M.P). 10. 'It is to me vain to think otherwise of the use of the IMPORTANT TESTIMONIES. 73 drug in China than as of a habit many times more per- nicious, nationally speaking, than the gin and whisky drink- ing which we deplore at home. It takes possession more insidiously, and keeps its hold to the full as tenaciously. I know no case of radical cure. It has insured, in every case within my knowledge, the steady descent, moral and physical, of the smoker, and it is, so far, a greater mischief than drink, that it does not, by external evidence of its effect, expose its victim to the loss of repute which is the penalty of habitual drunkenness.' {Sir Thomas Wade, C.B. ; China, No. ^,t?>']1.) 11. Sir George Staunton, who was the representative of the East India Company at Canton, said many years ago : ' It is mere trifling to place the abuse of opium on the same level with the abuse of spirituous liquors. It is {i.e., the abuse) the main purpose in the former case ; but in the latter it is only the exception.' BURMAH AND THE OpIUM TrADE. 1 2. Sir Charles Aitchison, Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, after an exhaustive examination, reported to the Viceroy: 'Among the Burmans the habitual use of the drug saps the physical and mental energies, destroys the nerves, emaciates the body, predisposes to disease, induces indolent and filthy habits of life, destroys self-respect, is one of the most fertile sources of misery, destitution, and crime . . . checks the natural growth of population, and enfeebles the constitutions of succeeding generations.' He went on further to say that this was a question, not of morality only, but of the salvation of a race, and that if the Burmans were to be saved, as a people, steps must be taken to limit or to put an end to the sale of opium amongst them. You have heard, and I have heard, that opium-smoking 74 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. is no worse than ' twiddling one's thumbs '; and yet here we have the Chief Commissioner of Burmah setting before his own Government that the salvation of the Burman people was dependent upon the putting down of opium- smoking. China and the Opium War. 13. Mr. Gladstone thus denounced it : 'A war more un- just in its origin, a war more calculated to cover this country with permanent disgrace, I do not know and I have not read of. The British flag is hoisted to protect an infamous contraband traffic ; and if it was never hoisted except as it is now hoisted on the coast of China, we should recoil from its sight with horror.' Chinese Noble Sentiments. 14. Keying, the High Commissioner, Lin's successor, when offered the assistance of the British Government to collect the duty if imposed, said : ' It would indeed be for the advantage of the Chinese revenues ; but we should thus certainly put a value on riches, and slight men's lives ; and I am apprehensive the great Emperor would not get over this.' Neither did he. The Emperor's memorable and oft-quoted answer was : ' It is true, I cannot prevent the introduction of the flowing poison ; gain-seeking and cor- rupt 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.' We should dissolve Partnership with China's Sin. 15. ' The people are being ruined by it, and it is indeed a lamentable spectacle to see professing Christian men IMPORTANT TESTIMONIES. 75 speaking and writing in defence of the horrible crime. The pernicious results of this soul and body destroying vice are apparent all around. . . . Yet professed Christians in England see no harm in it, and openly advocate the abomin- able traffic which makes it possible and comparatively easy for the Chinese to ruin themselves and their wives and children for time and for eternity.' {Archdeacon Wolfe.) 16. ' It is useless to say that the Chinese are growing opium themselves, and they will continue to do so, whether we import it or not. We have nothing to do with the possible or probable action of the Chinese in the matter. It is for us to wash our hands clean of the iniquity, and allow them to deal with it as they please. The trade is im- moral, and a foul blot on England's escutcheon. It is not for us to perpetrate murder in order to prevent the Chinese from committing suicide.' {^Rev. Griffith John, D.D.) 1 7. ' Let every missionary, and every lay agent, and every woman, and every child, refrain from being silent upon that question (the opium question). The opium traffic is the greatest of modern abominations, and I believe that unless it is corrected, it will bring upon this country of England one of the fiercest judgments that we have ever known.' ( The late Earl of Shaftesbury.) The Testimony of the late Mr. R. Montgomery Martin, at one Time a Member of her Majesty's Legislative Council at Hong-Kong. 18. 'Those who have the slightest belief in the Jewish and Christian Testaments must, at least with their lips, acknowledge that the Creator and Preserver of mankind has, by example and precept, established most conclusively the retributive decree, that as a nation sows so it must reap. Can England reasonably expect peace and plenty at home 76 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. when she is scattering poison and pestilence abroad ? Can she, without hypocrisy, consecrate churches, and ordain ministers of a Christian faith, while her rulers and governors are licensing opium-hells, and appointing supervisors to extract the largest amount of profit from the iniquity therein perpetrated? . . ' The records of wickedness since the world was created furnish no parallel to the wholesale murders which the British nation have been, and still are, hourly committing in China. ' The "slave trade'' was merciful, compared to the "opium trade." We did not destroy the bodies of the Africans, for it was our immediate interest to keep them alive ; we did not debase their natures, corrupt their minds, nor destroy their souls. But the opium-seller slays the body after he has corrupted, degraded, and annihilated the moral being of unhappy sinners, while every hour is bringing new victims to a Moloch which knows no satiety, and where the English murderer and the Chinese suicide vie with each other in offerings at his shrine.' A Reference to Letters from several Bishops of THE Church of England. 19. I must not close this chapter without referring to the fact that in 1882 letters were written by several Bishops of the Church of England protesting against our opium-traffic with China. But for the sake of brevity they have been omitted. What irony is there in the parody on Bishop Heber's beautiful hymn ! — ' Waft, waft, ye winds. His story !' — ' No ! — Waft, waft, ye winds, the opium. Prepared in England's name : To bring us golden millions, Whate'er may be the shame.' CHAPTER IX. MEDICAL OPINIONS. Testimony of the late Sir Benjamin Brodie. I. ' However valuable opium may be when employed as an article of medicine, it is impossible for anyone who is acquainted with the subject to doubt that the habitual use of it is productive of the most pernicious consequences, destroying the healthy action of the digestive organs, weakening the powers of the mind as well as the body, and rendering the individual who indulges himself in it a worse than useless member of society. I cannot but regard those who promote the use of opium as an article of luxury as inflicting a most serious injury on the human race.' {Sig7ud—B. C. Brodie.) The above was also signed by twenty-four of the most distinguished members of the London faculty — e.g.. Dr. R. Bright, F.R.S.; Dr. P. Latham ; Dr. Ferguson, F.R.S.; Sir C. Locock, Bart., etc. 2. Dr. D. W. Osgood, an American medical missionary, says : ' After a residence of more than ten years in China, and after treating about 50,000 Chinese patients, of whom 1,758 were treated for opium-smoking, I wish to record my conviction that the use of opium is an unparalleled curse ; that its effect in every instance is to diminish vitality and to 7S ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. shorten life In time the smoker becomes emaciated, and incapable of performing either continued mental or physical exertion. The Chinese themselves, after more tlian a century's experience and observation, universally condemn its use. Every rule has its exceptions, and occasionally we meet with those who have used opium for twenty or thirty years with but little apparent injury ; but they are the ex- ceptions, and not the rule.' 3. Dr. L. Porter Smith, late of Hankow, author of the Chinese ' Materia Medica,' says . 'I wish to place on record that, after an intimate acquaintance with the people, the literature, the language, and the commerce of the large provinces of Central China, I am compelled to describe the infatuation, the miserable saturation of the country, the " change of type " of the character of the nation, and the miseries wrought upon individual habit, constitution, temper and future, all exhibited in the course and consequences of the vice of opium- smoking in China, as forming a unique instance of national lunacy and suicide. No epidemic possession of any people or sects reads in such terrible details as are afforded by the simple story of this horror. At the same time I protest against gratuitous exaggeration being imported into the question, now able to take care of itself.' 4. Dr. Dudgeon, of Peking, the eminent medical mis- sionary, writes : ' Once habituated to the drug, everything will be endured rather than its privation. The pipe becomes the smoker's very life, and to satisfy the inexorable demands of the tyrant's craving there is nothing to which he will not stoop. In the case of poverty the wretched victim is driven to the perpetration of crime in order to secure the pipe. Time, wealth, energies, self-respect, self- control, honesty, truthfulness, honour, are all sacrificed at the flicker of the opium-lamp.' (^Friend of China,' June, 1876.) MEDICAL OPINIONS. 79 5. Dr. Little, who occupied a similar position to Dr. Dud- geon in Singapore, says : ' Upstairs I found one woman who had been an opium-smoker for three years. She stated she had two children, but they were very sickly and always crying. And how did she stifle their cries ? O women ! if you have a spark of motherly feeling in you, }'e will join with me in execrating this vice, whose practices are so horrible that, if I could not vouch for it, credulity itself might turn a deaf ear to my cry. I saw the woman pressing to her shrivelled, sapless breasts her weeping offspring, whose thin and yellow face and withered limbs showed how little sustenance was to be obtained there. Its shrill cries and convulsive limbs seemed now to excite the attention of the mother, who was all the time enjoying her pipe, when, to my horror and astonishment, she conveyed from her lips to that of the child's the fresh-drawn opiate vapour, which the babe in- spired. This was repeated twice, when it fell back a sense- less mass into its mother's arms, and allowed her quietly to finish her unholy repast.' The Leading English Medic.'^l Journal on the Opium Traffic. 6. The London La?icet says : ' Although reference was made (in the House of Commons in 1891*) to its tonic effect in small doses, in this country the sale of opium and its preparations is surrounded with ever)' possible pre- caution, clearly for the "physical welfare of the people." The morality of adopting a different code of ethics for the native races under British rule requires no discussion.' 7 . The Medical Press asserts that ' Opium is largely used in certain districts in India for the purpose of self-destruc- tion. In the Hardroi district, for instance, in 1890, out of 77 cases of suicide, 33 were due to this cause.' Dr. * Dr. Farquharson. So ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. McReddie, in the IniUan Medical Gazette, says the drug is used for this purpose because of the facih'ty with which it can be obtained. He estimates that ' from a quarter of an ounce to one ounce of opium is usually taken, often mixed with oil, which is popularly supposed to augment the action of the narcotic' Out of iSo suicides, extending over three years, in 97 cases opium was the agent selected. The Leading Indian Medical Journal on the Opium Traffic. 8. The editor of the Calcutta Medical Record, the leading Indian medical journal, is a man who has never been in official connection with the Government of India. His eyes are therefore unclouded to see the opium traffic in all its blackness. Government gold does not blind his mental and moral vision.- He is, moreover, a man of great practice amongst all classes of the community, European and native, and is thus entitled to speak with authority, additional to the fact of sitting in the principal medical editorial chair in Asia. In a recent issue he says : ' Whatever may be the value of the opium traffic in its huge fiscal policy to the British Government of India, it is very clear that the ever- increasing advocates for the suppression and abolition of the opium traffic by the State have a most powerful case against the Government ; and, however slow it may be to relax its hold upon this "golden egg" of revenue, the day dawns when it will be obliterated from the commercial list of State merchandise, to be found in its only rightful and legitimate place on the chemists' and druggists' register of poisons. In Great Britain the sale of opium is most guardedly restricted by the Pharmacy Act of 1868, which relegates its disposa to none but competent chemists, and MEDICAL OPINIONS. Si renders penal the smallest infringement which, by any device whatever, would make its sale possible in even the smallest quantities, thus most efficiently and safely protect- ing the lives of the people in that country. In India, however, things are totally different. Life is not so precious a commodity with the Indian Government that it needs to be protected from destruction by laws and legis- lative enactments. What is a deadly poison in England is calmly treated as a harmless condiment in India, a thing which the ignorant and the unsuspecting may use at their own sweet will. The afimchi or Opiurn eater is a genus whose number is legion in India and Burniah, and suicidal deaths from Opium burden the coroner's lists more heavily as the potent life-destroying agent employed than any other cause. Aside from the fatalities directly attributable to Opium, there is the physical ruin and moral degradation which attend its habitual use. Dreadful as are the evils of alcohol, the pernicious consequences of indulgence in Opium are more vastly terrible. By it human life is shorn of every vestige of nobility and moral responsibility. The mind is rendered insentiate to every ennobling desire or sentiment, and the moral nature of man is unfathomably degraded to even greater depths than brutishness. Just as deplorable are the effects upon the health of the habitu^ of opiates. . Digestion becomes steadil)' and speedily impaired, and the whole physical sequelae are those of emaciation, attenuation, and devitalization of muscle, nerve and brain. Opium numbers its victims by thousands in Calcutta alone, and every city throughout the length and breadth of this vast empire of India and Burmah yields a condemning freight of evidence of physical suffering, moral degradation, and social ruin, which none but a callous Government steeped in the luxuries of an irresponsible bureaucracy would dare to despise. Yet this awful stigma attaches to 6 ~ 82 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. the Government of India, that it not only freely permits the sale of a pernicious drug, but protects and encourages the continuance and permanency of its ravages among a people whom it has been called upon to regenerate and save. Let us hope that the doom of the opium traffic in India, Burmah, and China is not a distant accomplishment.' CHAPTER X. THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. The Bengal Opium Revenuk I. All the shipments from Calcutta, from which the Bengal Opium Revenue is derived, are the actual manu- facture of the Government itself; of opium prepared by them, not for the medicine so invaluable to the physician, but expressly for the purpose of vicious indulgence. This preparation for the Chinese market is manipulated by careful comparison with samples of what is preferred by the victims of the vice, in order to bring it up to their standard of excellence. Besides what is retained for consumption by their own subjects, the annual shipment of Bengal and Bombay opium together to China and the Straits settlements was, on the average of the last three years, upwards of 9'o,ooo chests. The average price was about ;£^no, and the cost about ;^42 per chest. The amount of the Bengal branch of the opium revenue, on the average of the last three years, was Rx.3,632,7ii,say;^2,724,534. The depreciation of the rupee, the bane of Indian finance for many years past, is greatly aggravated by the opium trade with China, which, on the one hand, causes China to export to India large quantities of silver, thus glutting the markets of the East with that metal, and, on the other hand, injures both British and Indian commerce with China by impoverishing the population of that vast empire. 6—2 S4 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. The Steady Increase of Revenue from Opium in Bengal. Mr. IMaurice Gregory has made the following statement relative to opium used by persons in Bengal : 2. I have added together the revenues for each year, as shown in the Government reports, from the three forms of the use of opium, viz., that used in the chandu shops where the Chinese system of smoking is in vogue ; that used in the inadak shops, a variation of the Chinese system ; and the raw opium sold for smoking and eating. It is of very little im- portance, as far as the welfare of the nation is concerned, which of the three forms is used, except, perhaps, that the last is the most secret and insidious. The revenue gamed each year from the consumption of opium by persons living in Bengal. Years. Rupees. In 1875-76 12,97,339 ,. 1876-77 i3jI6,io7 „ 1877-78 14,02,624 >. 1878-79 15,77.659 „ 1879-80 16,46,894 „ 1880-81 17,48,180 .. 1881-82 18,59,552 „ 1882-83 19.08,340 „ 1883-84 20,21,745 ., 1884-85 20,03,521 ,. 1885-86 19.75,569 „ 1886-87 ••■ ••• -•■ 20,19,146 „ 1887-88 21,07,638 „ 1888-89 21,30,141 „ 1889-90 ... ... 20,77,527 THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 85 It will thus be seen that the tide of revenue from the system is, with two slight ebbs only, steadily but surely rising, the first figures being to the last in the ratio of 100 to 160. With regard to the weight of opium consumed, the ' Reports of the Financial Results of the Excise Adminis- tration ' for Bengal, printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press, during the three years 1885-86 to 1887-88, give the follow- ing results : Revenue from, and consuinption of, opium ifi the presidency of Bengal.* Revenue Weight consumed Years. (in rupees). (in tolas). 1885-86 i9>7S>569 5,893,480 1886-87 20,19,146 6,041,360 1887-88 21,07,638 6,206,330 Bombay Opium Revenue. 3. The Bombay opium revenue is of a totally different character from that of Bengal. The opium from which it is derived is known as Malwa opium — the product of the native states of Central India. Before it can reach the port of shipment for China it must be transported through British territory, and for the ' pass ' so required a heavy transit duty is levied. The rate of this duty is determined from time to time by the Board of Revenue, regulated by the prices realized at the Government sales in Calcutta, which again are mainly dependent on the China market. The amount of this branch of the opium revenue is very * These figures deal only with opium consumed by natives of India, and have nothing to do with the drug exported for use in China. 86 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. considerable — on the average of the last three years Rx.2,433,72S (say ^1,825,294), after deducting charges, which are only i per cent, on the gross. Some Condensed Statements concerning the Opium Revenue and Indian Finance. 4. Those who wish to know more on ' The Opium Revenue and Indian Finance ' should read a pamphlet by Mr. Robert Brown, published at 33, East Howard Street, Glasgow, from which I make the following extracts : (a) ' The sole cause of our financial embarrassment,' he says, ' is extravagance, and the remedy can be found only in the old-fashioned formula : " Peace, retrenchment, and reform." ' (b) ' How does the Governor-General manage to spend ^3,500 on his outfit and passage to India ? To do the pre- sent Governor justice, he seems to have been very economical, as it cost ^^5,826 10s. id. to bring Lord Lytton home.' (c) ' A museum collection at Kew India is kind enough to provide for the delectation of tourists. Contingent expenses for the year are .5^545.' (d) 'Classifying salaries and pensions under "effective and non-effective," we observe that workers and non-workers are paid very much alike. 23,587 salaries ... ^9,879,235 Average ;^4i9 13,046 pensions, etc. ... ;^5, 264,549 Average ^403.' (e) ' The lunatic asylum at Ealing involves India in a loss of ^4,102, although it is difficult to see why she should be saddled with such a charge when the Imperial Govern- ment allows its lunatics to shift for themselves.' (f) ' If our Government had the slightest wish to effect THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 87 reforms and economies, they might very well make a begin- ning with the recommendations offered by one of their own committees, presided over by Sir Ashley Eden, which pro- mised a saving of over ^^i, 000,000 a year, with positive gain to the service, both in efficiency and popularity.' These allegations and others which might be mentioned require the most careful and thorough investigation, and it is to be hoped that the old-fashioned formula referred to may help us to solve the financial difficulty which is the greatest stumbling-block in the way of putting a stop to our Indian opium traffic, the revenue of which at present amounts to _:^3,8oo,ooo per annum. The Rev. Canon Wilberforce on the Indian Revenue. 5. 'First of all, we can diminish cautiously and wisely the expense of our civil service. I venture to say that it could be done by utilizing to a greater extent the services of the very intelligent natives who are prepared to work at smaller salaries than Englishmen. ' Secondly, unless I am very much mistaken, Lord Lytton, in the year 1879, appointed a commission of inquiry, of which commission Sir Frederick Roberts, present com- mander-in-chief, was a member, to consider whether it was possible to diminish the expenses of our Indian Army of Occupation. And, unless I am misinformed. Sir Frederick Roberts had said that, without diminishing in any degree the efficiency of the Indian Army, without taking away one jot or tittle from its popularity, without giving up anything that it is really important to preserve, the expenses of our Army of Occupation could be diminished by one million and a quarter . pounds sterling. Now we are getting on. 88 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. One million after another is beginning to be got together. And do you know what India is, what its wonderful resources are, that it is full of minerals, that it is capable of any amount of development, and that much may be brought about by increasing the facility of communication, by en- couraging other kinds of cultivation on that land now devoted to this abominable poppy, by encouraging the cul- tivation of potatoes, and of sugar canes, and of indigo, and of other crops which, as railway facilities increase, will pay the ryot better than opium? What we want is an Indian Administration in downright earnest about abolishing the opium revenue, and they will soon find the way, or they are not fit for their post. And this will only be done when the EngUsh people are in earnest first' Section I. — The Questmi of Revenue from a 'Per contra' Aspect. 6. It is very common to look in a thoughtless way at the enormous figures which stand in the Chancellor of the Ex- chequer's statement of the revenue derived from drinking, and to forget that in every district in England you are paying excessive police charges and charges for pauperism, and workhouses, and lunatic asylums, which stand as a per contra to all that revenue, and which, therefore, would largely diminish the net revenue to the country. And exactly the same thing, I am satisfied will be found to be the case with regard to the spread of this demoralizing drug among our own subjects, whether in India or in Burmah. You have to pay the per contra, which, in the case of China, falls upon the Chinese Government ; and therefore, it is the opinion of some who are perfectly qualified to make 3uch a statement, and who are acquainted with the districts, that THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 89 the revenue, as derived from India, or from Burmah, becomes a mere farce, because of the per contra, which must stand on the other side against the so-called revenue. Now, if once we could fairly establish that position, the whole money argument would be crushed, as it were, to pieces, and the House of Commons would then certainly not be able to make the poor plea of wanting the revenue. 7. Sir Charles Aitchison uses a remarkable expression with regard to the opium revenue — that the opium cultiva- tion is materially interfering with the due extension of land cultivation, and that even in Burmah the opium traffic was having the effect of reducing the land revenue. I am thoroughly satisfied that the opium consumed at the present time in India is very materially lessening the land revenue of India, and reducing it, I believe, by many millions a year. We understand that the land revenue of India is about _;^i9,5oo,ooo a year. 8. Why is it that Thibet is fast shut against the English on the southern side, while it is as easy for a Russian to cross from the northern side as it is to cross over from England into Scotland? Why is it that the western and south-western borders of China are tight locked against Englishmen, while the north-western borders hold out open arms to Russians ? There is no other reason but the fact that Russia, in the Kuldja treaty, put in an opium pro- hibition clause, whilst England is notorious for her desire to flood every corner of the Chinese Empire with Indian opium. Why this Great Fleet? 9. According to the statistics in Whitaker's Almanack for 1891 of the distribution of the British Navy, the following ships of war are all on the ' China ' station : 90 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. N.ime. Guns. Tonnage. Horse-power. Imperieuse lO 8,400 10,000 Alacrity 4 1,700 3,180 Caroline . ... 14 1,420 1,440 Firebrand . ... 4 455 400 Hyacinth . ... 8 1,420 1,190 Leander 10 4,30° 5,500 Linnet • •- 5 755 1,050 Mercury ■ - 13 3,73° 7,290 Peacock . ... 6 755 1,200 Pigmy . ... 6 755 1,200 Plover . ... 6 755 1,200 Porpoise . ... 6 1,770 3,500 Rattler . ... 6 7£5 1,200 Redpole . ... 6 80s 1,200 Severn . ... 12 4,050 6,000 Swift • ••• 5 756 1,010 Compare the horse-power of the smaller (but mostly de- structive) gun-boats with their tonnage, and imagine the rapidity with which they could run up rivers and creeks and destroy whole villages and towns. With such a tremendous force of something worse than pistols at the breast, and with the experiences that the Chinese have had, can it with any truth be said that they can do as they like ? From which revenue is the expense of the preparation and maintenance of this fleet of warships defrayed — the Indian or the home? If from the home, it makes us in England doubly responsible. Twenty Years' Trade with China and Japan Compared. 10. During the last twenty years, our export and import trade with China has gone down from ;^i 9,839,840 in THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 91 1870 to ;^i5,s63,9i2 in 1890. During the same period, our export and import trade with Japan has increased from ^1,873,466 in 1870 to £,^^,21.2, 2,66 in 1890; that is, while our Enghsh merchants, for some reason, have been losing trade with a vast population of 400,000,000 in China, our trade with Japan is three times as great as it was twenty years ago. In the historic impeachment of Warren Hastings in the House of Commons, the sixteenth article in the charges brought against him by the Right Hon. Edmund Burke is, with regard to the smuggling of opium into China, in the following words : ' If a profit has resulted from such a trans- action, no profit attending it can compensate for the prob- able risk to which British trade in China is thereby exposed.' Warren Hastings had the audacity to reply, ' I claim the merit of having created this revenue.' Section II. — The Question from a Moral Point of View. What Then? II. 'Sir Alexander Arbuthnot, in showing the importance of the opium revenue, said : " During the last twenty years the opium trade has supplied to the Indian treasury a net revenue of _;^r34,5oo,ooo." What if it has ? The sum is immense, but if the source of the revenue is unsatisfactory, the amount cannot be pleaded in its justification. ' If the people of England could but see for one hour the poverty and wretchedness, the ruin and death caused in China by the use of one million pounds' worth of opium, they would be horrified. What must be the extent of the deso- lation caused in China by the use of opium enough to yield the Indian Government a net revenue of ^134,500,000? 92 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. ' And yet Sir Alexander can dwell with complacency upon what this opium revenue has done for India. " Without the opium revenue," he says, "the education of the natives of India could never have been attempted upon its present scale ; the funds available for the administration of justice must have been largely curtailed; the cheap postage and the telegraph could not have been introduced ; the police must have been left upon its old inefificient footing ; the expenditure upon public works must have been very much less than it has been," etc. One reads such words with in- expressible amazement. 'Funds available for "the administration of justice," derived from a trade which, in its origin and in its continuance, has been one of the greatest acts of injustice the world has ever seen. How incongruous the thought ! If " the funds avail- able for the administration of justice " in India have been obtained by the perpetration of injustice in China, what then ? If the education of the natives in one country has caused the destruction of the natives in another, what then ? If efficient police in India means the corruption of officials in China, what then ? If cheap postage, telegraphs, public works, and other improvements in India involve the dete- rioration of China, what then ? Must we, with our eyes opened to see that these things are so, go on in our wrong- doing? Surely Sir Alexander Arbuthnot and other Indian officials would not, could not, plead for the Indian opium revenue if they knew all that its maintenance involved in China.' (' T/ie Truth about Opium Smoking^ by B. Broom- hall.) A Business which is Demoralizing China. 12. 'Those who grow and sell the drug, while they profit by the speculation, would do well to follow the consumer THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 93 into the haunts of vice, and mark the wretchedness, poverty, disease, and death which follow the indulgence ; for did they but know the thousandth part of the evils resulting from it, they would not, they could not, continue to engage in the transaction. It has been told, and it shall be rung in the ears of the British public agaia and again, that opium is demoralizing China, and becomes the greatest barrier to the introduction of Christianity which can be conceived of ' Calculating the shortened lives, the frequent diseases, and the actual starvation which are the results of opium- smoking in China, we may venture to assert that this per- nicious drug annually destroys myriads of individuals.' {The late Dr. Medhurst.) The Chinese Practise the Golden Rule of Confucius. 13. The opposition to opium has been thorough. The Chinese put morality first and finances nowhere. Great Britain and India put finances first and morality nowhere. Confucius gave us the golden rule in the negative form. He said, 'Do not to others as you would not that they should do to you '; and the Chinese practise it. The Christians of the West have got it in the positive form, and they do not practise it. I have never heard one sermon in all my life preached upon the positive form of the golden rule in this country. Our practice, our profession, our com- merce «eem to militate against the golden rule. One^ blood boils to be called a 'foreign devil' everywhere in China. But when one considers the opium question there is no more in this name than we deserve. We are foreign devils for having introduced the ' foreign dung ' — • ' the devil's dung' — because that is the name by which opium is called in China. 94 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. History teaches that God Punishes Nations for THEIR Sins. 14. There is a God who judgeth in the earth. The American Civil War, the French Revolution, and other events in history remind us that God has ever vindicated His justice in the government of the world and of nations in the past ; and He will surely do so again. Therefore let us lift up our voice and cry aloud, if so be we may awaken the conscience and sympathy of the Christian churches in these realms, and persuade those who are doing so much to enslave the Chinese in this fearful way to take oif the heavy burden and let the oppressed go free. A View of the Case not always Remembered. 15. ' The contribution from opium traffic of about ^8,000,000* every year to the Indian revenue, acting like a bribe, has promoted the avoidance of the question as to the righteousness or unrighteousness of England's conduct towards China. But now the public conscience is awake, and we may reasonably expect that China's wrongs at our hands will undergo full investigation ; and that, if it should be found needful for righteousness' sake to sacrifice even the whole (which will, however, probably not be the case) of the opium revenue, our rulers will not hesitate to follow the dictates of justice and humanity, and suffer some inconvenience as retribution for the past injustice. And yet I am sure of this, that every sacrifice made in the name of God, either by an individual or by a nation, shall receive a full reward. We should never forget that reply of the prophet to Amaziah, the King of Judah, who had hired of the King of Israel a hundred thousand men for a hundred talents of silver. * This was when the revenue was mucli larger than it is now. THE FINANCIAL ASPECT. 95 " But there came a man of God to hiin, saying, O king, let not the army of Israel go with thee ; for the Lord is not with Israel . . . And Amaziah said to the man of God, But what shall we do for the hundred talents which I have given to the array of Israel ? And the man of God answered, The Lord is able to give thee much more than this " (2 Chron. xxv. 7-9.) By plenteous harvests, by increased and successful commerce, by averting wars, by a more widely extended spirit of honesty and industry, and in a thousand ways, great and small, God is able, if He will, so to add to th« material prosperity of this empire, that whatever is required for its government shall be raised without extraordinary measures, without any murmuring of the people.' (Extract from Charge by the Bishop of Madras.) CHAPTER XI. SOME STATISTICS CONNECTED WITH THE OPIUM QUESTION. The Retail Prices of Opium in India. I. The retail price of opium in India varies according to the amount of taxation received by the Government upon it. The cost of twelve tolas of opium is as follows : Rupees. I n the native poppy States where there is no license ... ... ... i o or In the native poppy States where there is a license ... ... ... 2 In Bombay In Calcutta In Madras In Rangoon o or 12 or 8 or 3 4 7 8 or II 12 12 or 19 d. 7* 9 3 These figures give very little idea to the English reader of the actual cost, or to the Indian reader either, for the matter of that. Let us therefore reduce them to the price of poisonous doses of opium. Let us take an ordinary English family of a father, mother, and five children. At the highest computation, twenty-eight grains would put every one of them to a speedy death. At the above prices the cost of poisoning such a family would be— STATISTICS CONNECTED WITH OPIUM QUESTION, gj In the unlicensed poppy States ... one farthing. In the licensed poppy States . . . one halfpenny. In Bombay ... ... ... one penny. In Calcutta ... ... ... one penny-farthing. In Madras ... ... ... twopence. In Rangoon ... ... ... fourpence. Present Consumption in India. 2. The quantity of Bengal opium issued to the excise and medical departments during the ten years 1878-7910 1887-88 does not appear to have materially increased, the average being 4,562 chests ; but for some years past it has been the practice to supplement the Bengal production, for excise purposes, by purchasing a number of chests of Malwa opium. The Bombay Presidency has always been supplied with Malwa opium. The ' Statement on the Progress and Condition of India for 1885-86' contains the following passage : ' The consumption of opium in Bombay goes on in- creasing; 1^5,394 lb. were disposed of in British districts of the Presidency, and 141,396 lb. were sold in the native states subordinate to it. Smuggling is still largely practised in the northern portions of the Presidency, for contraband opium to the amount of 2,097 lb- was captured during the year.' He.4VY Increase in the Consumption of Opium in THE Bombay Presidency. 3. The report on the administration of the Opium Depart- ment of the Bombay Presidency for 1889-90, lately issued, shows the astounding fact that enough opium wass old for local use in the twelve months under report to have killed 7 98 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. every man, woman, and child twenty-one times over, sup- posing they had never taken the drug before. The quantity sold for local consumptioti was close upon 500,000,000 poisonous doses of four grains each. The increase in the quantity sold in the whole Presidency for local consumption only (not for export to China) was in the one year twelve per cent. The Bombay Presidency Sinking in the Quicksands OF Opium. On page 144 of the 'Bombay Administrative Report ' for 1889-90, just issued, details are given of twenty-two districts of the Bombay Presidency in which the increase in the local consumption of opium has been the least. The following are the results, divided into poisonous doses of four grains each : Annual consumption of opium in twenty-two districts only of the Bombay Presidency, in poisotious doses of four grains each : Annual average for three years ending ) 1885-86 ^ I 207,945,270 1887-88 227,188,038 1888-89 ••• ••• •-• -■• 236,726,534 1889-90 ... ... ... ... 252,130,950 Increase in consumption from 1885 to 1890, in five years only, twenty-one per cent. Reduction in the Price of Opium in the North- west Provinces and Oudh. 4. In the North-west Provinces and Oudh, the Government have reduced the price of opium to enlarge its home con- STATISTICS CONNECTED WITH OPIUM QUESTION. 99 sumption, and, in that district alone, opium shops have increased in one year by loi (1,027 to 1,128). The veteran Indian missionary, Thomas Evans, writing in the Bombay Guardian of September 6, 1890, in reference to the preparations of the Government ■ to increase the desolating opium habit in India, says : ' Is this the mission which God gave the English in this country ? As true as the Moslem reign came to an end through its oppression of the people in another way, so true is it that, if we follow the bad example, God will put an end to the British raj. May our governors be wise before it is too late !' Increased Consumption of Opium in the City of LuCKNOVy. 5. It is unpleasant reading, and ominous of the troubles to come if this suicidal policy be persevered in, to learn, for instance, that in a city like Lucknow, with its terrible history, the consumption of opium increased from 36,240 tolas in 1883-84 to 64,320 in 1887-88. China's Annual Opium Bill. 6". The introduction and sale of opium extends to all the cities and villages of the land, the Chinese expending on it more than $50,000,000 (about 10,000,000 pounds sterling) every year. By this means the rich are made poor, and the poor led to sell their children, and its curse appears in the dissipation of the wealth of the land. Scholars, agriculturists, artisans and merchants, represent the constant and productive employments of the people. When once they acquire the opium habit they become weak, inefficient and indolent in every department of labour : evfery form of handicraft deteriorates, business suffers and 7—2 lOO ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. time is squandered. There is no worse evil than this, and its curse appears again in the gradual destruction of the industries and trade of the country. The Number of Average Medical Doses forwarded FROM India to China every 'Good' Year. 7. Averaging the adult medical dose, half a grain, and the infant medical dose, one-twentieth of a grain of opium, we find that the 80,000 chests forwarded to China every •good' year, under the auspices of the Government of India, contain 259,677,090,909 medical doses, sufficient for 741 doses for every man, woman, and child in the Chinese Empire. Some Statistical Paradoxes explained. 8. I will close this chapter on figures with a few observa- tions, because some facts connected with them are so paradoxical. The opium revenue is diminishing, and the area of ground on which the poppy is grown in India is becoming less ; yet the quantity of opium consumed there is increasing. The simultaneous diminution of the revenue and the increased consumption in India may very easily be explained. The revenue is diminishing because China does not purchase so much Indian opium as formerly. The diminution of the area used for poppy culture is accounted for by a considerably less quantity being sent to China, and by a succession of good crops. Although China is importing less opium, she is perhaps consuming more, since an increasing quantity is being raised in that country. The two words ' branch establish- ments ' explain another paradox, that more opium is consumed in India although the number of licensed STATISTICS CONNECTED WITH OPIUM QUESTION. loi places may be diminished. The statements about poisonous doses may seem incredible, but it must be remembered that when one becomes habituated to the drug, a very much larger quantity can be taken than would be sufficient to kill a novice, without producing any immediate alarming result. The sale of opium, except for medical purposes, cannot be justified ; but what must we think of ourselves, seeing that it is sold in India at such a low rate that a family of five can be put to death for a sum varying from one farthing to fourpence ! And why, we may ask, should such a difference in price as i,6oo per cent, be tolerated? In the Daily Chronicle of August 19, 1891, it was stated that in India ' This destructive drug (opium) being sold unrestrictedly in the bazaars, self-murder by means of it is now largely resorted to.' CHAPTER XII. THE OPIUM TRADE IS FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERN- MENT. Our Government is practically Dishonouring ITSELF WITH REGARD TO THIS OpIUM QUESTION. I. The following given in evidence before a Committee on Indian Finance will prove that they are so doing. Sir Cecil Beadon, as Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, under whose administration the whole opium revenue was placed, was examined before that Committee, and these questions and answers are placed on record : Q. I understand you to say that opium is grown in India simply for the purpose of revenue ; no moral considera- tions at all influence the Government ? A. The Government only regard opium as a means of obtaining revenue. Q. If, for instance, they thought they could obtain more revenue by doubling the cultivation of opium in India they would do so, and would not be deterred from adopting such a course by any considerations as to the deleterious effects which opium might produce in the people to whom it was sold? A. Probably not. Q. Therefore you may say generally that your sales of OPIUM TRADE FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT. 103 opium in India, as well as in China, are adjusted to obtain the utmost revenue possible. A. Yes. Q. But it has been the wish of the Government not to encourage the consumption of opium among their own subjects ? A. I do not think that the consideration has had much weight with the Government ; as far as I know, I think their object has been to get as much revenue out of opium as they possibly can. Q. And the Government would have been quite ready to see it consumed by their subjects as well as by the Chinese ? -4. I do not think the Government have ever regarded the subject in that point of view, but only looked upon it in a fiscal point of view, and endeavoured to get as much revenue out of it as they possibly could. Official Statements as to the Number of Opium Licenses require the most Minute Investigation. • 2. The following statement of a highly respected Bombay missionary, the Rev. H. H. Daniels, deserves special notice. He says : ' At Thana, a few miles from Bombay, only two Government licenses are reported. This return is made out /or use in England, as well as in India, but the fact that these licenses carried the power to open branch establish- ments, and that there are twenty-eight " servants " keeping opiura-dens all over the district, is not mentioned in the latest official reports.' The charge therefore is that the officials may return only two licenses, and not mention the twenty-eight sub-licenses. This is a very serious matter. On Thursday, Jiine 25th, 189 r, Sir John Gorst, the Under Secretary for India,Jadmitted that in some returns in his 104 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. hands there were twenty-two licenses down for the district of Thana. These were private ones, which ought to be pubhshed. It was stated in the House of Commons by Sir John Gorst that the total number of places licensed for the sale of opium in the Indian Empire is only 8,834, whereas their own Government blue-books show 11,244 places to be so licensed. It is bad enough to know that the blue-books give in some cases by far too low a number ; it is still worse when we find the same thing carried on by the Indian officials here in England. The same process extended a little farther would make out that there were no opium-dens at all in India ! Another Misleading Official Statement. 3. In answer to an attack in the House of Commons upon their policy, the Government of India said, on February 4th, 1890: 'The numbers of shops (in Luck- now) licensed for opium-smoking has been steadily and persistently reduced, till the number is now as low as is consistent with refraining from the impossible task of absolutely preventing the smoking of opium. The number of shops for opium-smoking in the Lucknow district was In 1883-84 12 In 1885-86 6 In 1887-88 3' Mr. F. B. Mulock, the Deputy-Commissioner of Lucknow, had reported to the head Government on August 24th, 1889, that a heavy increase of consumption of opium at the smoking-shops in Lucknow had accompanied the decrease in their number. Here are Mr. Mulock's figures from p. 182 of the same report : OPIUM TRADE FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT. loj No. of Weight of opium con- Year. shops. sumed at all the shops. 1883-84 .. 12 36,240 tolas 1885-86 .. 6 41,680 „ 1887-88 .. 3 64,320 „ Misleading Statements in the House of Commons. 4. We now come to the alleged long-continued en- deavours of the Indian Government to restrict the con- sumption of opium. In the House of Commons, on April loth, 1891, Sir J. Fergusson said: 'The Government 'of India have diminished the number of licenses, and they have diminished the area on which the poppy was grown. One hundred thousand acres less are now under poppy in Bengal than ten years ago.' On the same occasion Mr. W. H. Smith said: 'The course which this Government has taken, and which all Governments have taken, during the last few years — for the present Government takes no credit for greater care and considerarion for the morality of the people of India than has been shown by preceding Govern-, ments — has been to diminish the area of cultivation in India to an extent, in the last five years, at any rate of twenty per cent. TJie production and sale of opium has been decreased considerably in each year, and that must be taken as an indication of the policy of the Government.' The, above extracts are from ' Hansard's Parliamentary Debates,' in which an asterisk indicates that the reports were revised by the speakers before publication. There can be no doubt; therefore, as to the accuracy of the quotations. We learn, then, that the policy of the restriction of the production and sale of opium, which the Government of India are said to have pursued, has been taken, if not at the instigation, certainly with the approbation of the home or Imperial io6 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. Government This was enforced further on in the speech by Mr. W. H. Smith, above quoted. He said : ' Oar policy has greatly diminished the cultivation and consumption of the drug, and that policy which has been carried on wiiA marked success during tfie last Jive years would be persevered in: Facts are Stubborn Things. During the last five years which have been officially reported upon, the consumption of opium in the Bombay Presidency has increased twenty-one per cent, {vide ' Report of the Administration of the Bombay Presidency for the year 1889-90,' printed at the Government Central Press, Bombay). In Bengal the attempt to decrease the consumption of opium has taken the form of increasing the shops for its sale! In the administrative year, 1886-87, the number of licenses for the sale of opium was 2,040 ; the next year it was 2,319. The following year's report shows a further increase of S7- In the latest report (1889-90), the statistics of these licenses are suggestively omitted. The ' Report on the Administration of the North- West Provinces and Oudh, for the year ending March, 1890,' printed at the Government Press, Allahabad, gives a table showing, not a decrease, but an increase in the revenue from opium in that portion of India, from 1885-86 onward. In 1888-89, the number of licensed opium shops rose there during the year from 1,027 to 1,128. Increase of nearly Fifteen Hundred Opium Shops IN Three Years. The reports of the various presidencies and provinces are not drawn up upon a uniform system. A class of infor- OPIUM TRADE FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT. 107 ipation that is given in one report is omitted in another. For instance, they do not all state the number of licenses to sell the devastating drug. That the increase reported in some cases, however, is but part of a general increase may be gathered from an answer given in the House of Commons to Mr. Samuel Smith, by Sir J. Fergusson, on March 9th, 1891. Sir J. Fergusson said : ' The number of opium shops licensed by the Government of India is 10,417.' It was officially stated in 1888 that the number of such shops was 8,931. This shows that the policy which ' has greatly diminished the cultivation and consumption of the drug,' and which 'has been carried on with marked success during the last five years,' has succeeded in three years in adding 1,486 to the number of shops for its sale. We may now inquire into the alleged humanitarian policy of reducing the cultivation of the poppy. On page 36 of the ' Report on the Administration of Bengal for 1889-90,' we read: 'The number of opium chests sold was, as in the two previous years, maintained at 5 7,000, as in view of the extension of opium cultivation in China, it was not considered desirable to increase the quantity, nor, on the other hand, was it desirable by a reduction to run the risk of losing our hold upon the Chinese market. As, however, there had been a succession of bumper harvests, there resulted an accumulation of chests in stock, and a reduction in the area under cultivation was therefore resolved on and carried out in the year under review.' The Naked Reason Why. The Bengal Report for the previous year says on page 39 : ' The season was a successful one, for while the area under cultivation fell short of that of the preceding year by 40,711 bighas, there was an increase of over 15,000 maunds io8 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. in the quantity, and a marked improvement in the quality and consistence of the drug produced. There has of recent years been a noteworthy change in the pohcy of Govern- ment in respect of the manufacture of opium. Prior to 1885-86 the object was to extend cultivation, but the large stock of the drug in hand at the commencement of that season rendered it advisable to put a stop to any further increase in production, and the continued accumulation of an excessive reserve, both at Calcutta and in the factories, has led to the issue of subsequent orders directing a specific reduction in the area of cultivation.' According, therefore, to the British administrators in India who are charged with the production of opium, the reduction of the area under cultivation, 'which has been carried on with marked success during the last five years,' has been due, not to feelings of humanity or philanthropy, nor to remorse or repentance over spreading a deadly vice among the millions of India, Burmah, and China ; but to prior over-production, and ' the continued accumulation of an excessive reserve.' The reports plainly indicate that if the demand for the poison had continued to be equal to the production, the area under cultivation would not have been diminished, but increased. The Indian Budget deserves a more Important Place, and ought to occupy More Time in our Imperi.\l Deliberations. 5. In the year 1891 the Indian Budget, which concerns one-sixth of the human race, was regulated in less than three hours ; and that too on the day before the prorogation of Parliament, which is the very worst business day of the House of Commons, for it was almost empty. It has been said that it would be an insult to the India Office to ask OPIUM TRADE FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT. 109 for too close an inquiry into their acts. But is it not universally recognised that Church and charity accounts should be audited and full details furnished, however unimpeachable and capable those who keep them may be ? Much more then should a Budget which concerns two nations be fully discussed, specially as allegations have been made to the effect that India is charged with some items which she should not be asked to pay. For instance, India is charged with Her Majesty's political establishment in China, for a mission to the court of Persia and for a con- sulate at Yeddah ! Every month's delay in the abolition of the opium traffic is attracting more and more attention to other departments of Indian finance. It is probable that the fear of a general investigation is causing Anglo-Indian officials to so bitterly oppose the abolition of the opium revenue. The repealing of a lessening revenue of about X3,8oo,ooo a year on the greatly increasing revenue of India cannot of itself account for this fact. A large increase in the revenue from opium is also shown in the ' Report on the Administration of the Punjab and its Dependencies for 1889-90,' an additional incentive to the sale of the poison having been given by ' the import throughout the year of Malwa opium at the reduced duty for sale by licensees ' (vide Report, page 159). We are encouraging the Opium Trade against the Wishes of our Burmese Subjects. 6. The opium habit was spread in Burmah by a similar Satanic device to that which had been so successful in China. Under native rule, the punishment for using opium was death. But with the introduction of British rule, 'organized efforts were made by Bengal agents to introduce the use of the drug, and to create a taste for it amongst the no ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. rising generation. The general plan was to open a shop with a few cakes of opium, invite the young men, and distribute it to them gratuitously. Then, when the taste was established, the opium was sold at a low rate. Finally, as it spread throughout the neighbourhood, the price was raised, and large profits ensued.' ( Vide evidence of Dr. George Smith before a Parliamentary Committee in 187 1.) In 1880, Sir C. U. Aitchison, Chief Commissioner of Burmah, reported officially : ' The papers now submitted for consideration present a painful picture of the demoraliza- tion, misery, and ruin produced amongst the Burmese by opium-smoking. Responsible officers in all divisions and districts of the province, and natives everywhere, bear testi- mony to it. To facilitate examination of the evidence on this point, I have thrown some extracts from the reports into an appendix to this memorandum. These show that, among the Burmans, the habitual use of the drug saps the physical and mental energies, destroys the nerves, emaciates the body, predisposes to disease, induces indolent and filthy habits of life, destroys self-respect, is one of the most fertile sources of misery, destitution, and crime, fills the gaols with men of relaxed frame, predisposed to dysentery and cholera, prevents the due extension of cultivation and the develop- ment of the land revenue, checks the natural growth of the population and enfeebles the constitution of succeeding generations.' Sir C. U. Aitchison also wrote : ' When reviewing the report on the administration of criminal justice for the year 1877, my attention was drawn to the change which was alleged to be gradually coming over the Burmese, national character under British rule. One of the principal causes assigned was the growing habit of opium-smoking.' Shortly afterwards, when on a visit to Akyab, I was waited upon by a large deputation of the most influential natives OPIUM TRADE FOSTERED BY OUR GOVERNMENT, iii of the town, who presented a petition describing, in very forcible language, the misery entailed on the population by opium, and praying that the traffic in opium might be altogether abolished in Arakan.' In consequence of these disclosures, the Government felt obliged to order a reduction in the number of opium shops in Burmah, and public indignation was thereby (as will be seen) too easily appeased. It was subsequently officially stated to the British House of Commons that the number of opium shops in the whole of Upper and Lower Burmah had been reduced to thirty ; and to one in the Akyab district, from which the before- mentioned petition had been presented to the Chief Commissioner, the highest Government official. The key to this assuring parlia- mentary statement is furnished by Mr. Maurice Gregory, one of the editors of the Banner of Asia (Bombay), who, writing from Akyab in December last (1890), says: 'It is perfectly true that there is only one opium shop in the Akyab district dealing directly with the Government, but this opium shop distributes the Government opium to many hundreds of other shops. I saw yesterday at Akyab fifty of these dens in less than forty-five minutes. Mr. Htoonkyawoo (a Burmese gentleman, who kindly acted as my guide) told me that his estimate of the number of dens in the Akyab district, the town included, was at least a thousand, all supplied by the one licensed shop which appears in the Government reports.' Another paragraph from Mr. Gregory will complete this picture of what British rule is doing for the inhabitants of Akyab (notwithstanding the protests of its best citizens) ; and, as per sample, for the people of Burmah generally. ' I have been,' he says, ' through the accident wards of the largest accident hospital in the world, the East London Hospital. It was a sorrowful sight, but the sympathy ^112 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. for the sufferers was mixed with a feeling of satisfac- tion that they were so well attended to. But my visit to the Akyab dens yesterday was one of unmitigated pain of heart. The emaciated frames, the stertorous breathing, the fevered pulse, the wrecked lives, the ruined souls, lay heavily upon me. Dozens of the victims, thinking that I was a missionary, asked me for some medicine to stop the terrible pain which accompanies the slightest cessa- tion of the use of the drug after the first few months from the commencement of the habit. They all knew the drug was ruining them, and they all wanted to give it up, but dared not face the racking torture of the process. Eventually I had a sort of an open meeting of about a hundred of them, to whom I explained through Mr. Htoonkyawoo that 1 had come to assist them if I could, and, God helping me, I would tell all the Christian people I could reach about their sad case.' While these facts illustrate the oft-shown value of official parliamentary statements on moral questions in far-distant possessions, ought they not also to touch the quick of the Christian conscience of Great Britain, and lead God's people to ask with mourning and tears, and a resolve for practical repentance, what He thinks of a thousand licensed opium hells at a place under a so-called Christian Government, while in the city itself there is not one resident Christian missionary ? OPIUM TRADE FOSTEHEU BY OUR GOVERNMENT, in, We are, and have been, in Different Wavs foster- ing THE Opium Trade in China. 7. Cardinal Manning, at the Mansion House, described our dealings with China in a very terse manner. He said: 'It has been going on now for a period of forty years. By rrteans that are secret, I mean smuggling ; by means that are violent, I mean war ; by means which I hardly like to characterize, which I will call diplomacy, we have been forcing upon the Chinese population the consumption of a poisonous drug.' CHAPTER XIII. CONCLUDING REMARKS. The Reform called for, both in the Excise and Opium Departments in India must come from the Moral Pressure brought to bear upon the House OF Commons by the Public in England. I. The refonn we demand in the latter department is the total prohibition of the traffic, except for medicinal purposes. The real power is not in India, but in England, and as such it is not the Indian Government that is responsible so much as the Imperial Government and the British public at home. We would venture to suggest to our leaders in Parliament the immediate need of a thorough investigation of the whole question, and we would ask them to study carefully the most recent statements on the subject, because since the debate of April loth, 1891, the East India financial statement for 1891-92 has been published, and in it the highest revenue official of the Indian Government states, on page 13, that he hopes the opium revenue from the Chinese trade will go up. Also since April loth the annual statement of the moral and material progress of India has been published, and in it figures are given showing that the consumption of opium increased in the last year under report in every province of India except one. Surely some- CONCLUDIXG REMARKS. iiS thing should be done, in the face of these new facts, to counteract the false impression caused by their statements to the effect that 'The Government of India, bad as had been its action in the past, is now doing all that it can to diminish the use of opium in Asia.' This Question should be zealously kept outside THE Range of Party Politics. 2. The question must on no account be made a political party question. It is unwise and useless to cast reproaches upon the present Government Would Mr. Gladstone, had he been in power, have acted otherwise ? If so, why did he not support Sir Joseph Pease? The names of Sir William Harcourt, Sir George Trevelyan, and others on the same side of the House, are also conspicuous by their absence from the division list. Good men on both sides of the House have identified themselves with the anti-opium movement, and it would be a calamity and a discredit to make the matter one of party. We should ascertain the View of our Candidate ON this Subject. 3. I think, in view of an election, much might be done by making this somewhat obscure subject better known, if those who take an interest in it were to ask the view, and solicit information from their candidate, and thus bring forward a topic which is too much in the background. At present so little is thought about it that, as far as I know, an election has never been won or lost on account of candi- dates' view on this subject. If our opium policy were made the battlefield even of a few elections, it would be, I venture to predict, the means of calling the attention of thousands 8—2 lie ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. to it, and all we require, with God's blessing, to gain the victory is to make the facts of this question, in all their horrible details, better known throughout the length and breadth of our land. I specially appeal to the clergy and ministers of the Gospel, also to those temperance advocates who put questions to their candidates, to help us in the same way in our fight against a much greater evil. It is the duty of every Christian to do his utmost to see this national iniquity done away with. If we are to attain our object, moral pressure must be brought to bear by the people, specially by the power of their votes, strong enough to break down a very long- standing traditional Government policy, which is never opposed by those who occupy the Opposition benches. It is to be hoped, however, that the exposure of this iniquity may be sufficient to effect its downfall, but I am doubtful on this point. Anyone taking up this question runs some risk of being suspected of party bias, his allegations necessarily appearing to be an attack on those at present in office. Let me then assure my readers that as a whole I most heartily concur with the splendid foreign policy of our present Government ; nevertheless to my mind there is a blot in it, which, as I have just observed, the Opposition are equally unwilling to remedy. Let us, then, manfully take our part, in the name of God and humanity, and use every lawful means we can to put an end to our opium traffic. The Power of a Hundred Votes. 4. ' ... If a certain number of electors joined the movement, so as to make it worth a hundred votes or so to each candidate at a parliamentary election, the thing would be done. Both candidates would take the pledge to avoid loss, and both parties would give in their adherence. There CONCLUDING REMARKS. 117 can be little doubt that even now some votes are to be gained in some places by attacking the opium monopoly, and none can be got anywhere by defending it.' {Friend •/ India a>id States man.) No Delay. 5. It is urgently necessary that we should take warning by an incident which occurred just a century ago in the course of the great movement for the abolition of the slave trade. Quoting from Clarkson's 'Abolition of the Slave Trade,' vol. ii., p. 347, we find that in the year 1787 the members of the House of Commons, as well as the people, were enthusiastic in behalf of the abolition of the trade. In the year 1788 the fair enthusiasm of the former began to fade. In 1789 it died. In 1790 prejudice started up as a noxious weed in its place. In 1791 this prejudice arrived at its growth. But to what were the changes owing ? To delay ; during which the mind, having been gradually led to the question as a commercial, had been gradually taken from it as a moral, object. In place of the slave trade having been held up as a great crime against God, calculations as to pounds, shillings, and pence were brought before the public eye, and the abolition of the trade, which ought to have taken place in 1787, was not finally won until 1807. God is not Mocked. 6. 'Are we not taught by Scripture that God can, in His own way and time, now as ever, and by fitting instrumen- talities, visit the earth with judgments, and thereby carry out His holy purposes ? Verily, though " the natural man " may see the natural only, yet the " spiritual man " can see .a iiS E.\GLA\'D'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. living God also, if not in, yet from, His working ; a God who, in perfect harmony with all law, can, in the world of matter and of mind, touch far-offsprings of power, by which forces may be either produced or held in check, so as to do His will. He surely can give to or withhold from man wisdom, skill, genius, power, and in many ways, which no human eye can foresee, may reward well-doing or punish wrong-doing. He can punish the wicked by even letting him " eat of the fruit of his own ways, and be filled with his own devices." And He can humble the pride of wealth, punish its selfish expenditure, and destroy the godless boasting of commercial prosperity, by the action of laws which can affect the treasures of gold and silver, through other treasuries known to Himself alone, such as " the treasures of the snow and of the hail, which He hath reserved to Himself against the day of trouble " ; and by rain poured down or withheld from His secret laboratory, He can make the exchanges of the world to tremble or rejoice.' (From sermon preached by Dr. Norma?i Madeod, published at the Queen's command, and also by Jier command dedicated to Jier Majesty.') A National Warning. 7. When the civil war between the Northern and Southern States of the American Union was raging, John Bright is reported to have said, ' To doubt the issue is to doubt the rule of Infinite Goodness and Wisdom in the affairs of men.' The saying is no more trite than it is true : ' Individuals are requited in a future state, nations in the present.' Has Britain had no warnings to that effect ? What connection, it may be asked, was there between the slaughter of the opium destroyers at Canton and the massacre of an entire British army in Cabul ? What connection between the CONCLUDING REMARKS. 119 extortion of opium legislation from China and the horrors of the Sepoy Mutiny ? ' Just this much, and it might be well to realize it : that He who observed the one permitted the other. They who wilfully blinded themselves to the sufferings of the Chinese were left in blindness to their own danger until it came upon them as a thunderbolt.' {From the Church Missionary Intelligencer. ) Summary. 8. Our proposals are as follows : i. That the Bengal system of licensing the growth of the poppy, and of manufacturing opium, be at once stopped ; except so far as may be needful for legitimate medical use. iL That the necessary measures be at once taken, by raising the tax or otherwise, to prevent any extension of the cultivation of the poppy in Malwa, so as to compensate for the diminution of the supply from Bengal. iii. That the Chinese Government be approached with proposals for diminishing the export of Malwa opium simul- taneously with the suppression of the growth of the poppy throughout China. iv. That the retail sale of opium throughout India be limited by measures having the same object as the provisions of the Pharmacy Act in force in Great Britain, namely, to restrict the sale to that which is required for medical use alone. v. That the licensed shops for opium-smoking throughout India be at once closed, and vigorous measures taken to sup- press all such establishments, (y. G. Alexander, LL.B.) ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. An Important Question. 9. Will the anti-opium party ever be strong enough to carry out their proposals? My first answer would be sufficient for many, but I will give more. i. God and righteousness are on our side. ii. We have already obtained a majority on one occasion in the House of Commons. iii. The provinces of York and Canterbury, represent- ing the Church of England ; all the Roman Catholic bishops throughout the "United Kingdom ; the Scotch Churches; the Nonconformist bodies, have all petitioned Parhament on this subject. iv. Several members of Parliament, since the last divi- sion, have declared that in future they will vote on our side. V. In this compilation there has been brought side by side a great company of witnesses, who, by God's help, with others will never rest until they have persuaded our rulers to put an end to this infamous traffic. Some will remember this quotation : ' A nation pays its awful debt of hardness and neglect even more certainly than an individual, because its life is longer. A man may die quietly and unpunished after years of thoughtless cruelty and selfishness, but a nation cannot do so, because it lives so long that the inevitable fruit of vengeance has time to ripen and fall in this world.' My allegations have been stated. A summary of pro- posals as suggested by Mr. J. G. Alexander, LL.B., has been given. These, I think, should be only looked on as a rough outline of the policy of the anti-opium party, subject to slight modifications or amendments. I hold that in dealing with the Malwa opium much more stringent measures CONCLUDING REMARKS. I2i will be required. The positive demands of the Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade are two only, viz. : i. That all coercion shall be withdrawn from China, and that the Government of that country should be left absolutely free to prohibit the entrance of our opium altogether, or to lay upon it what taxes it pleases. ii. That the British Government of India shall not en- courage and promote the opium trade. I need scarcely add that the policy of non-interference could not for a moment be tolerated. The Times condemns it in these terms : ' In that case India would be flooded with cheap opium, which would do more to deteriorate the people than all our education, and all our missionaries, and all our efforts at honest government have accomplished for their welfare.' In conclusion I wish to restate the chief reasons for calling the opium traffic ' England's greatest national sin.' They are these : i. Because we do not make it as difficult for our subjects in India and Burmah to obtain a poison as it is in this country. ii. Because we are still acting unjustly to China. iii. Because it is a very great hindrance to the missionary cause. iv. Because our whole opium policy is contrary to the teaching of the Gospel, ' Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' If we would wipe away this national sin we must be up and doing. Let us refer to this subject from the pulpit ; let us remember it at missionary meetings. Let it have a place at our temperance gatherings. Let us take in some periodical, that we may be informed on the latest phase of the movement. Let it have a corner in our periodicals. May the press continue to help us ! We would specially 122 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. be thankful for more help from the secular press. Let us introduce the subject in our conversation. Let us make it the topic of a lecture. Let us point out the sin to our politicians, and ask them for an immediate remedy. But we must never be contented with a compromise. Above all, let us bring it to God in prayer, confessing our national sin, and praying that it may soon be done away with once and for ever. ' Bane instead of blessing Britain pours to-day Over India's millions. Under Britain's sway ; China's countless myriads Hate the name we bear ; Deep the wrong inflicted ; Deep the shame we share ! ' For Salvation's message, That its way may be Glorious in its triumphs. Setting millions free. By our sin no longer Hindered in its flow. Forward into battle. Christian soldiers go ! APPENDIX A. SOME OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. I. The following are short answers to the most frequent objections ; many of them have been made in our Parliament. Much more could be written on the subject, and those who have read this book from the beginning will perhaps be able to give longer and more convincing answers. I have not here considered the financial objection, which is by far the most important, because a whole chapter has been given to that subject. We will commence by considering some general OBJECTIONS. 2. ' Opium is far less deleterious than alcoholic liquors. It certainly could not be said of opium, as of alcoholic liquor, that it led directly to crime.' If selling wives and children into the very vilest of immoral slavery by opium-smok- ing husbands, in order to satisfy their ' crave,' is not crime, then alcohol leads the way. Sir Charles Aitchison, Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, after careful and exhaustive examination, reports to the Viceroy of India : ' The habitual use of the drug is one of the most fertile sources of misery, destitution, and crime.' 3. ' We tax this opium heavily, just as the Chancellor of the Exchequer taxes whisky. There is no more national guilt in taxing a drug than in taxing a spirit.' This, again, ignores the fact that our Indian Government licenses the growth of the poppy, advances money to the licensee to enable him to grow it, purchases from him the whole of his crop, and manufactures the opium to suit the Chinese 124 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. market. This applies to most of the opium produced in India. 4. ' The opium trade is just as defensible as the Excise system of this country.' But the opium trade in India and our Excise system differ in this fundamental point : The Indian Government is the actual producer of two-thirds of the opium exported from that country. Sir Robert Fowler, M.P., correctly and tersely says : ' The position of the Indian Government in regard to opium is not analogous to that of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, who taxes spirits, but rather to that of the distiller who produces them.' Section I. — India. 5. 'A commodity for which their country is peculiarly suited by nature.' The poppy plant is not a natural growth in India. It requires the most careful cultivation to keep it in existence at all there, and takes up, in artificial irrigation, from four to eight times the quantity of water required for honest food and cotton crops. The poppy grows naturally, that is, in a wild state, only in temperate climates like England, and there it yields exceedingly little opium. 6. ' The abolition of the growth of the poppy would take the bread out of the mouths of multitudes of peasant families.' What a mistake ! Not one cultivator would be put out of work. His land would be immediately required for other and honest crops. Large quantities of land now lying out of cultivation would then be cultivated, the water that is now wasted on the poppy being available for that purpose ; the price of food would go down all over India, nay, all over the world, in consequence, and bread would be put into the mouths of millions of peasant families. At present the Government taxation is so arranged that the cultivator only obtains a very little more profit on an acre of poppy land than he does on an acre of land devoted to food crops. Were his water, however, available for culti- vating a larger portion of land (as it would be were poppy cultivation abolished), he would derive a much larger annual income from other crops than he now does from the poppy. APPENDIX A. 125 7. 'The poppy could be grown in every man's back garden.' There are no back gardens in India. The farmers live in villages, and all their lands are together. 8. ' It vcas not we who exported it, but the tradesmen who did it to their profit.' I might as well say I had nothing to do with the produce of my land, because I did not sell it personally in London or Manchester. 9. ' The Malwa opium was raised in native states, greatly to the advantage of their people.' The poppy grows on the finest food producing land. It takes up one of the two crops of food or cotton. The consequence is, when a year of scarcity comes, famine comes with it, there being no cheap food. The last famine in Rajputana was largely due to this cause. 10. 'They were rapidly increasing in population, their trade was extending, and their industries flourishing.' It is not the opium consumers who are causing this prosperity, any more than the drunkards of England are the cause of her prosperity. Section II. — China. Opium is no longer forced on the Chinese. 11. Look at the following statistics, carefully com- piled from the returns issued in i8gi : Horse-power. Horse-power of the Chinese Fleet (the only fleet in which the 7iame of a foreign nation is men- tioned) ... ... ... .-■ ... ... 48,010 Horse-power of the Fleet for all the rest of Asia, including India, Burmah, and the Straits Settlements 3Sj292 The Pacific Fleet (part of which is presumably held ready for use in Chinese waters) ... 29,680 The Fleet for the whole of Africa.. North America (Canada) and the West Indies Australia South-East Coast of America 28,700 28,480 26,551 7,610 126 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. 12. ' China was perfectly free to impose any tax she chose upon Indian Opium, which, in fact, was at her mercy.' According to an ' Additional .^rticle' of the Cheefoo Agree- ment, 188;, opium was admitted to all free ports of China after a total payment of 1 10 taels dues per chest at the port There are English officials there to see that this is carried out. 13. It has been loudly proclaimed that the new agree- ment has completely changed the character of the trade. It is said that the terms were proposed by China, and that she is perfectly satisfied that smuggling is now impossible, and that a largely increased revenue is going into her exchequer. To all of which arguments it can truthfully be replied that the old hateful coercion is as strong as ever ; that China merely capitulated to the exigencies of her position, and that she will be satisfied only so long as she is too weak to demand the absolute freedom to which she is entitled. The amount of tax which she may levy is still subject to our approval, and the central Government is bound to allow^ free distribution of the drug all over the empire, guarded against additional provincial taxations. If, therefore, China was under constraint when the Tientsin Treaty was signed, if the British Government refused to repeal or relax the provisions of that treaty regarding opium, when appealed to by the Chinese, it is impossible to deny the touching death-bed utterance of the Marquis Tseng — the very man who drew up the ' Additional Article ' — ' We are not free.' Can anyone be surprised that his countryman, the Viceroy Li H. Chang, asked, ' Would not the demand for a prohibition treaty with Great Britain bring on a third Opium war?' 14. 'Only one in 150 persons in China obtains access to opium.' This statement is doubtless based on an estimate made some years ago by Sir R. Hart, Chief of the Imperial Chinese Customs Service. There are, however, no reliable statistics available for the whole country. In some districts very little is used, in others over half the adult males are addicted to the use, besides some women, and even children, and undoubtedly it is largely on the increase. If only one in 150 use it, it would be easy to prove that those using must consume enormous quantities, for it must be remem- APPENDIX A. 127 bered how potent a drug it is — how very small a piece would be a poisonous dose. 15. 'Chinese opium is inferior, and Indian opium is superior.' This is quite true, the way I read it. Indian opium is stronger, more injurious, and the Chinese say with truth that it will ruin a man three times as quick as their own will. 16. 'If we do not send opium to China, others will.' We are considering, for once, a moral question ; and to say that someone else would do a wrong if I did not, is no excuse for me. Brown murdered Smith for _;^ 1,000 of blood-money ; he alleges, as a sufificient excuse, that if he had not done so, Robinson would have murdered the un- fortunate man, or even that Smith would have murdered himself; and that in either of these events he, Brown, would have lost his _;^i,ooo. From a financial point of view, Brown's reasoning is admirable. But can any man suppose such a defence good in any form whatsoever, whether of law or of conscience ? It is precisely the old argument that was used with regard to the slave trade, and was exposed with so much humour by Cowper : ' Besides, if we do, the French, Dutch, and Danes Will heartily thank us, no doubt, for our pains ; If we do not buy the poor creatures, they will : And tortures and groans will be multiplied still.'* The question, however, is not who is to supply the demand, but is it right for us to do it? That others are prepared to do a wrong act, if we fail to do so, would hardly justify us in doing it. That it is wrong to be engaged in a traflfic through which some millions of people are reduced to desolate misery and ruin, who can for a moment doubt ? The very instincts of humanity rebel against the thought of making money at the cost of debauchery and death to our fellows. And yet, in spite of it all, this is done. 1 7. The editor of Medical Missions at Home and Abroad speaks some brave words. He says : ' But, say some, others will cultivate and sell or smuggle opium if England does not Very well, let them do so, though China may be pretty well trusted to look after any successors of England * ' England, Opium, and China,' by Sir Edward Fry. I2S ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. in this particular business. Because another is ready to play the thief, it is no reason surely why I should steal. Indeed, he is a poor creature who would use the argu- ment. ' Yes,' says another, ' but if we give up the trade, and China goes on henceforth to grow the poppy, what gain will there be ?' A very great gain. We shall have ceased to do evil. We shall have put God in the place of mammon ; we shall have sown a seed of righteousness among the nations which could not but bear good fruit ; we shall have cheered the heart of every Chinaman that loves his country, and given an encouragement to remedial legislation in China as no other action could have done. Are these little gains ? 1 8. Again, others say if China thinks it an evil, why does she cultivate the plant within her own borders ? The answer is, that it has been a matter of necessity, because certain officials in our country said that since it was im- possible to prevent the foreign drug from entering, it was well to memorialize the throne to permit its growth in our own country, in order to stop the outflow of silver. This is indeed not what a powerful country would do, but our country is not powerful. Knowing the reason of its cultiva- tion, we are convinced that if England takes steps to stop the trade, ours will stop its growth here. We Christians in China know full well that Englishmen respond to that attribute of God which views all with equal benevolence, respect international intercourse, and cherish in their hearts the sentiment of ' Give not unto others what one does not desire for himself,' and consequently that they will not cast aside, as if unheard, this matter, which is full of woe to our people. We have driven them in self-defence to cultivate the poppy for themselves, so that now whole provinces are well- nigh covered with it, and an intelligent and cultured China- man, in a lecture in San Francisco, complains that about 80,000,000 of Chinese are being poisoned with the drug. And are we now to be told that because the Chinese have consented to legalize the traffic which they again and again fought and struggled to prohibit, and which they may well now believe is too powerful and gigantic for them to deal with, are we to be told that on this account the injury we APPENDIX A. 129 have wrought is wiped out, that we are now innocent, and that our responsibility is at an end ? What ! when we have only contrived to get rid of the charge of coercion, and still carry on the old traffic and pocket the money ! Responsi- bility at an end, when the direful curse that we have let loose is still working havoc upon millions of our fellow-men, and we have done nothing to counteract the evil and repair the wrong ! Is this the sentiment of the British people ? Then this is not the land of Howard and of Clarkson and of Wilberforce. I maintain that if such a position as that be taken and represented as the position of the British people, then justice has taken her flight from our dishonoured land, and pity for rriankind is dead. But I will never believe that the conscience of the British people is so callous as that, or that the religion of Him who came to ' deliver the needy when he crieth, the poor also, and him that hath no helper,' has so little hold upon the minds and hearts of this people. 19. It has been said by certain cynical and superficial Englishmen : ' If the Chinese ruin themselves by opium, that is their own affair ; why do they not abstain from it ?' If thousands of the sons and daughters of respectable parents, in nominally Christian countries, fall annually into the condition of habitual drunkards, is it to be wondered at that hundreds of thousands, in an unchristianized land like China, yearly fall victims to the much more fascinating opium vice, not to speak of the children who are born with the craving ? It needs a residence among Asiatic races to comprehend how fascinating this vice is, and especially to understand how awful the struggle that is required to break it off, in which so few succeed. Evil habits are always con- tagious, but more emphatically it is thus with the great plague of Asia, which breaks down the power of the will, and holds its victim with a grip equal to that of impurity, mth a legion of other devils also. The plea of ' Am I my brother's keeper ?' by the tempter of his brother, the opium- producer, and his aiders and abettors, is not more likely to avail than when it was first uttered by Cain, and he was driven forth as a fugitive and a vagabond. To-day, in con- sequence of the plague which Great Britain has let loose upon China, India, and other parts of Asia, the voice of our brother's blood is crying unto God from the ground. APPENDIX B. FACSIMILE OF FIRST PART OF A BOMBAY OPIUM LICENSE, WITH EXPLANATION. I. During Mr. Alfred S. Dyer's first visit to India, in 1887-88, he was the means of discovering a terrible secret document issued by the Government of India in relation to the State provision of vice for European troops. He sent home a copy, which was printed in facsimile, and forwarded to every member of the House of Commons, as well as a number of leading Christian men and editors of newspapers. This document was afterwards printed at the order of the House of Commons as ' Parliamentary Return 197 of 1888,' and was, in God's hands, the means of striking the great death-blow of June 5th, 1888, to the Governmental traffic in vice in India. Mr. Dyer, who is again in India at the present time, has been the means, in God's hands, of the discovery of an equally infernal document on the opium question. A fac- simile of the first part is given on next page. A facsimile of the whole has been published by the London Committee of Urgency for the Abolition of the Opium Traffic, and has been sent to every member of Parliament. Copies can be obtained gratis from Maurice Gregory, 31, Paternoster Square, London, E.C. An Explanation from the Blue-book published on February 9TH, 1892. 2. ' The special object of checking smuggling has been the No. 1. FOR ALL DISTRICTS OF THE BO.MBAY PRESIDENCY, INCLUDING THE TOWN AND ISLAND OF BOMBAY and THE PROVINCE OF SIND. Form £. LICENSE FOR RETAIL SALE OF OPIUM. District Number of License in the Register Name of Retailer Locality of shops BE IT KNOWN that resident at in the town of is hereby authorized to sell Opium by retail at the shops above mentioned from the day of to the day of (both inclusive) upon the following conditions : — I. That he will sell by retail at the shops aforesaid not less than ( ) pounds of duty-paid Opium in the aggregate during the period aforesaid. If he sells less than that quantity, he will pay to the Government in the manner and on the dates hereinafter specified penalty at the rate of Rs. 5 per pound on the quantity of Opium 1.32 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. insertion in the licenses of a condition that the farmer shall ])ay duty in each year on a certain minimum quantity of opium, even though his actual sales should fall short of that minimum. . . . We are of the opinion that the stipulation . . . has been one of the main causes of the success which the Government of Bombay have attained in repressing smuggling in the last twelve years.' (Page lo, section 22.) A Partial Withdrawal of some Statements. Had I read the above explanation before sending my book to the press, my condemnation of the Bombay license w^ould not have been so strong ; but I still consider it a very objectionable document, specially when we take into account the large minimum quantity of opium required to be disposed of, and the great difficulty there must be in fix- ing the quantity so accurately as on the one hand to prevent smuggling, and on the other not to give an encouragement to the sale of the drug. More need not be written on this point, for on page 109, paragraph 4 of the blue-book just referred to it is stated that 'the Government of Bombay have been requested to stop the practice of requiring licensed opium vendors to sell yearly a guaranteed minimum quantity of licit opium.' There is no need to exaggerate or to misrepresent the Government policy. There will be good reason to protest, so long as we, a professedly Christian nation, and well educated, allow opium to be sold to a heathen nation, not so well edu- cated, and without those restrictions considered absolutely necessar)' among ourselves, in order to protect the few from the illegitimate use of a poison. Let us go to the root of the matter, and demand' the suppression of the growth and manufacture of the poppy except for medicinal pur- poses. 3. In the right-hand corner of the front page of the original license, from which this facsimile is taken, is a long list of opium shops the property of the licensee. Mark the fact, o^ie license, many shops. On page 182 of the Bombay Administration Report for 1889-90 (printed at the Govern- ment Central Press, Bombay), there are 831 licenses APPENDIX B. 133 reported for the Bombay Presidency. These 831 licenses may mean thousands of shops. Clause 1 of the license which will be seen on page 131. — The Government of India, through their representatives in Parliament, have assured us that they are doing all they can to lessen the consumption of opium (see the speeches of the First Lord of the Treasury, and of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in the debate in the House of Commons on Sir Joseph Pease's Resolution, April loth, 1891). Note, however, the fact that by this Clause i the licensee agrees to sell a certain fixed quantity of opium during the period of his license, and if he fails to do so, the Government heavily fines him. In the original license, the number of pounds in the space left blank in our facsimile amounts to several tons. In the same license for another part of the Bombay Presi- dency, the little district of Broach, containing a total popula- tion of 326,930 men, women, and children, this Clause i runs (if a yearly license) : I. — That he will sell by retail at the shops aforesaid not less than 12,492 lb. of duty-paid opium in the aggregate during the period aforesaid. If he sells less than that quantity, he will pay to the Government in the manner and on the dates hereinafter specified penalty at the rate of Rs. 5 per lb. on the quantity of opium required to make up the said minimum. 12,492 lb. of opium is ovex five and a Jialf tons, and this enormous quantity has to be divided out amongst a little population of 326,930 men, women, and children, and if the licensee fails to do it, he is heavily fined. This is 'doing all the Government can to lessen the consumption of opium ' with a vengeance ! The authority for this weight of opium, contracted under penalty to be sold in the Broach district, is an official ' remark ' printed in the margin of ' C ' Appendix on Excise in the aforesaid Report on the Administration of the Bombay Presidency for the year 1889-90.* * The exact words run, 'He (the Broach licensee) is required to purchase 1,041 lb. monthly. T34 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. It appears from another column in Appendix 'C that the licensee at Broach sold 2,039 lb. short of his contracted quantity last )'ear, so that, according to his contract, he would be fined Rs. 10,195, '" order to make him push his trade a little faster next year. Rs. T 0,000 fine for not being able to sell 5^ tons of opium (20,000,000 four-grain poisonous doses) amongst 326,930 people ! And this is called 'restricting the opium trafl5c within the smallest possible limits !' The fourth clause of the license refers to the examination of the opium by the 'collector' of the district. All opium sold in Government licensed dens has to be of ' prime ' quality ; that is to say, of the strongest possible character. It is brought to the collector's office, examined, a cord run through the ball, and to the cord the collector's seal is affixed. Then it is ready for sale. Note the fact that a 'collector' is the chief magistrate of the district. He sends the opium out from his office with his seal affixed, and then tries and sends to prison the thieves and other criminals who are the direct result of his opium. The fifth clause is to the effect that the licensee must have plenty of this ' prime ' quality opium kept in stock at the place ordered by the collector, usually his own police- office. This stock is in case of a sudden rush of business on the part of the licensee. Clause 7 tells us that the licensee is fined every month that his sales are short. In order to encourage him to push the sale next month, this fine is remitted if he sells an equal quantity in excess of his contract. Thus, if his contract is to sell 1,000 lb. of opium a month, he is fined Rs. 500, if he only sells 900 lb. in January. If, however, by enticing fresh customers, he manages to sell 1,100 lb. in February, the fine is remitted. Under Clause 8 the collector is empowered to seize all opium the property of the licensee, to pay his fines, etc. Clause 14 limits the retail sale to one person at a time to ten tolas, or 1,639 grains Apothecaries' weight. The custom amongst English chemists is to supply not more than one grain without a doctor's order. Ten tolas of opium would put to death fifty-eight families, each family consisting of father, mother and five children. And according to APPENDIX B. 135 this license, any baby, in the Bombay Presidency, that can toddle and talk, can be sent to the Government stores for this'jinfernal quantity of poison. Very often the collector sees a good opening for business in the opium line. Under Clause 17 a, he sends an order dovsp to the licensee, who is forced, ' immediately on receipt,' to open the new shop. Under Clause 25, the collector has power to inflict a fine of Rs. 1,000 if the licensee is not quicjlc enough in opening the new den. Cfauses 17 and 18 order that the dens shall be kept decently and orderly. Five years ago the Govern- merit of India were the keepers of ' decent ' and ' orderly ' houtes of ill-fame. They were swept away by the blast of indignation, roused by the Spirit of God in the Christian Chilrches, in 1888. The same thing will happen to the 'decent ' and 'orderly ' Government opium hells. ^Clause 21A deals with opium - smuggling. Wherever opium is sold for vicious purposes an enormous amount of smuggling goes on. Smuggling in the form of the concentrated drug it is impossible to stop, but the growth of the poppy is exceednigly easy to prevent. In India it is not a weed scattered all over the place, as in England, but requires the most careful cultivation during months of the year to keep it alive at all. It is a most prominent crop, and very easy to destroy. No Jew ever drew up bond more carefully than this opium license. Under Clauses 22, 23, 24, and 25, the collector (always a European magistrate) has the utmost power of bringing pressure to bear upon the licensee, so as to continually increase the traffic in the deadly drug. In sixteen districts alone of the Bombay Presidency, between the periods 1885-86 and 1889-90, these English magistrates ran up the consumption of the drug in weight thirty per cent, (see page 144, Bombay Administration Report, 1889-90). The following are the exact figures : 136 ■, ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. Weight of Opium sold ill Sixteen Districts only of the Bombay Presidency. I Annual average for three years ending 1885-86. 1889-90. lb.» lb.» . Bombay . . . 13,225 20,194 / 26,061 / Ahniedabad 25,800 Kaira 11,929 16,108 Panch Mahals ... 2,6go ... 3,063 Surat 4,068 4,113! Khandesh 10,372 16,434' Ahmednagar ... 7,772 10,797 i Sholapur . . . 6,767 7,862 1 Satara 3,°04 4,373 Dharwar ... ... 571 696 Bijapur ... ... 342 418 1 Rutnagiri ... ... 199 259 Kolaba ... ... 558 763 Karachi . . . 3,911 S.023 Hyderabad (Scinde) 7,170 10,733 Shikarpur ... 2,439 3,200 100,817 130,097 The latter part of Clause -24 is important. Some of the licenses are for three years. Perhaps in the middle of this term someone comes along to the collector and says, ' I will engage to sell so many tons a year more opium, in this district, than the present licensee.' Under the latter half of this clause the collector has power to terminate the license at three months' notice, and hand it over to the fresh licensee. The license closes up with the collector's signature and seal. This seal is also placed on every ball of opium passed out for sale, in accordance with Clause 1 1 of the license. With the same seal he stamps Government warrants for the apprehension of thieves and other criminals, whose evil acts are the outcome of the opium already supplied by him. * These are nominal pounds of 40 tolas each (see Clause 21 of license) ; 40 tolas is equal to 6,558 grains Apothecaries' weight. Every single 'lb.' in the above list, therefore, would poison 1,634 men, women, and children, who had never tasted the drug before. APPENDIX B. ' 137 A Quotation from a Madras Presidency License. 4. One of the specialities is Clause 27, by which the collectors (magistrates of the district) close all shops for the sale of opium ' on or adjacent to the line of march whilst a regiment or detachment of soldiers is passing or is encamped in the vicinity.' The Indian Government boasts of the magnificent physique of its Rajput regiments, and throws dust in the eyes of the British public by pointing to them and saying what magnificent specimens of humanity opium- eaters may be. Query : Why should they be so careful to keep the opium from these magnificent Rajput soldiers ? APPENDIX C. THE SLAVE TRADE A CENTURY AGO, AND THE OPIUM TRAFFIC TO-DAY. The fact that God is unchangeable is one that is often brought before our attention, but it is also no less a fact that sin is unchangeable. Nowhere in history is there a more remarkable illustration of this unchangeableness of sin than in the reports of the two great debates : that on William Wilberforce's motion against the slave trade on April 19th, 1791, and Sir Joseph Pease's motion against the opium traffic on April loth, 1891. A comparison of the Morning Chroiiide for April 20th, 1791, with the London Times for April nth, 1891, offers parallels almost ludicrous in their similarity. The slave- traders of a century ago offered exactly the same arguments in favour of their traffic as the opium-traders of to-day. For instance, Sir William Young said that ' the slave trade is absolutely necessary to our property in the West India Islands.' So to-day the supporters of the opium traffic say that ' the opium trade is absolutely necessary to our posses- sion of India.' On April 19th, 1791, Sir WiUiam Young, speaking in the House of Commons, further said that ' were we to abolish the slave trade, other nations would take the advantage of our imprudence, and take it up with avidity.' In the House of Commons on April loth, 1891, several members, speaking in favour of the opium traffic, used pre- cisely the same ' burglar's argument' What has happened in the abolition of the slave trade a century ago will happen in the abolition of the opium traffic to-day. Precisely in the same way as England is chief sinner of all the nations in the APPENDIX C. 139 opium trade to-day, so she was chief sinner in the slave trade a century ago. It was felt then, as it is felt now, that it was the duty of England in the first place to pull the enormous beam out of her own eye before she could see clearly to pull the little mote out of the eyes of the neighbouring nations, and so the anti-slavery party, im- mediately upon the passage of Mr. Wilberforce's great resolution, successfully moved as the next step that inter- national treaties should be made with the other maritime Powers, extending the suppression of the traffic to the borders of all countries dominated by their influence. So to-day our duty is to clear the skirts of England of her huge share in the traffic, and then with an honest face we can treat with foreign nations for the suppression of their exceedingly small share in the trade. But to return to Sir William Young on April 19th, 1791. He continues : ' Serious and dreadful would be the conse- quences of the passage of Mr. Wilberforce's motion. He (Sir William Young) was sure the slave-traders would them- selves be best able and most willing to bring forward such propositions as might answer all the wishes of those humane gentlemen, without any bad consequences resulting from them.' Is this not precisely what we heard the other night in the House of Commons ? ' Serious and dreadful ' would be the consequences of the passage of Sir Joseph Pease's motion. By far the safest plan, according to some of the speakers, was to leave the whole matter in the hands of the Indian Government, who were, according to them, fully as humane in regard to the opium traffic as Sir Joseph Pease and his supporters. Lord John Russell followed Sir William Young, and dwelt upon the importance of ' this very considerable branch of commerce ' {i.e., the slave trade), and ' the in- justice of injuring the very respectable body of men engaged in the trade.' He repeated the ' burglar's argument ' about other nations taking up the trade when England dropped it, and said that if there was to be abolition, let it be very gradual, as he was very 'confident that many serious and alarming consequences would follow a precipitate abolition of the trade, which ought not to be risked for a measure which was only vague, speculative, visionary, and chimerical, I40 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. which could answer no one specific purpose. Regulations of the slave trade might be necessary, and nobody would object to them, because they were sure that the ends pro- posed might be effected, the dignity of the country asserted, and all those cruelties and enormities, so pathetically described, prevented, without a rash and total abolition of the trade.' The debate was concluded by Mr. Alderman Watson, a great authority of the day on trade, who appeared to be a sort of combination of Sir Richard Temple and Dr. Farqu- harson. He said that ' if humanity were concerned in the question, he should be as ready to support that cause as any man. The fact was, however, that the natives of Africa were taken from a worse state of slavery in their own country to one more mild. The abolition of the trade, he contended, would ruin the West Indies, destroy our Newfoundland fishery, which the slaves in the West Indies supported by consuming that part of the fish which was fit for no other consumption, and consequently, by cutting off the great source of seamen, annihilate our marine.' The moral of the whole thing is that, just as the slave trade was doomed, so this greater opium traffic is doomed. Preceding Mr. Wilberforce's motion, the Christian Churches were flooded with information upon the subject. God, by His Spirit, burnt that information into the hearts of His people, who rose up and demanded the extinction of the traffic. The same thing is happening to-day, and, by God's grace, the same results will crown our efforts in the extinction of the opium trade. APPENDIX D. PARTIAL VICTORIES. I AM most pleased to report that, since this book was placed in the publisher's hands, a blue-book on ' The Consumption of Opium in India ' has been published, and in it are to be found some concessions on the side of virtue. One of these is the abolition of a Bombay Government license, reproduced in another Appendix because it may still serve to show what our Government recently did for the protection against smuggling ; they stooped so low as to run the risk of en- couraging the opium vice. Another possible partial victory is an order by the Government of India to refuse licenses to smoking shops ; it is to be carried out ' wherever it can safely be adopted without risk of serious disorder.' The Times refuses to express an opinion on the result of the above measure, and says : ' Whether opium-smoking in private is less harmful than smoking in the public dens is a question on which at present we do not feel able to offer an opinion.' Some official statements made in the blue-book, published on February 9th, 1892, are to the effect that the Viceroy's proposal to close 936 opium-dens is a futile suggestion, while he leaves untouched 10,308 central stores for the purposes of debauch. The Commissioner of Ajmere (page 50) says : ' With refer- ence to the suggested closing of the opium-smoking shops, I am of opinion that it would result in the opening of private smoking-dens, which would . . tend rather to attract than repel new smokers. I am of decided opinion that it would not cause any decrease in the use of the drug.' 142 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN D. C. Johnstone, Esq., Junior Secretary to the Financial Commissioner, Punjab, says (page 6 1 ) that the closing of the public dens in Lahore has resulted in the establishment of private ones. H. J. S. Cotton, Esq., Secretary to the Government of Bengal, Financial Department (page 65) : ' The smokers of opium will resort to unlicensed dens.' K. G. Gupta, Esq., Secretary to the Board of Revenue, Lower Provinces, Bengal (page 67): 'What would happen in Calcutta (if the above proposal of the Viceroy were ' carried out) ? There is no difficulty whatever in drawing the necessary conclusion, because it can safely be inferred from what already goes on. From five to twenty opium-smokers would meet together in out-of-the-way and retired rooms, when opium would be sold to them, and smoked by them as at present. If discovered, they would declare that it was their own opium, which they had purchased for the occasion. At the present moment there are scores of illicit opium-dens in Calcutta, in spite of the existence of the licensed shops.' J. Lambert, Esq., CLE., Commissioner of Police of the City of Calcutta (page 70) : (If the above proposals of the Viceroy were carried out,) ' a much larger number of people would be led astray by being tempted to resort to private dens, which would at once spring up in large numbers. This would open out a new field of mischief. The supply of the drug would still be equal to the demand.' E. V. Westmacott, Esq., Commissioner of Excise, Bengal, one of the highest Excise officials in the Indian Empire (page 70) : ' The closure of the licensed shops would lead to an increase in the number of private dens. I do not think there would be any decrease in opium-smoking.' A Conflicting Statement. From D. C. Johnstone, Esq., Junior Secretary to the Financial Commissioner, Punjab (page 6r, section 8, of blue-book just referred to) : ' The result of the closure in Delhi has been favourable, . . . and the number of chandu-smokers is steadily diminishing. . . . The closure in Lahore was not so sue- APPENDIX D. 143 cessful, but now the Deputy Commissioner admits that, though smoking clubs frequented by old hands are common, the new regulations certainly tend to discourage further recruitment of the ranks of the smokers. As to Peshawar, a special report has been received from Mr. Mark. Opium-smoking began there in 1865; and in 1887, when the shops were closed, there were 300 to 400 regular frequenters. After one year's closure the number of habitual smokers is reported to have fallen to 50 or 60, and native public opinion is strongly in favour of the new policy. . . . Government certainly loses revenue by the closure of the shops, and must expect to lose revenue for some years.' In the last blue-book, published on ' The Consumption of Opium in India,' allusions were made to, but no hope given that the time is near when the opium trade in India would be regulated by the same laws as applied to it in this country. In fact, such a step is reported to be outside the range of practical politics. Medical opinion, however, both in England and India would put the drug on the same footing in both countries. A memorial has just been signed by 5,000 members of the medical profession stating that they are of the opinion : (a) That the drug opium ought in India, as in England, to be classed and sold as a poison, and be purchasable from chemists only. (b) That the Government of India should prohibit the growth of the poppy, and the manufacture and the sale of opium, except as required for medical purposes. The Calcutta Medical Record says : ' What is a deadly poison in England is calmly treated as a harmless condi- ment in India, a thing which the ignorant and the unsus- pecting may use at their own sweet will. Great pressure must be put on our Government before they will consent to enact laws analogous to those contained in the Pharmacy Act, 1868, for India, under which the retail sale of opium is regulated in this country. It should, however, require a very strong argument to justify the continuance of the growth of the poppy, for sensuous purposes, in a country where the plant is not indigenous, and in which, according to a statement made at the National Congress, held at Nagpur on December 30th, 1891, it was said that there 144 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. were in India from 50,000,000 to 60,000,000 of half starving paupers, and that the only possible remedy was to improve " the moral standard of the people.'" On February 19th, 1892, there was presented to the House of Commons a petition from India against the opium traffic, numbering over 22,0.00 signatures, in several lan- guages, in which there is a very strongly worded protest against the sale of opium in that country without being labelled ' Poison.' This is only one of several such petitions from India on the same subject. Moreover, I have seen quotations from twenty-five Indian newspapers — Hindu, Mohammedan, and Christian — all condemning our opium trade. The following is a quotation from one of them, Mufidam (Agra) : ' The traffic in the obnoxious drug has proved to be a deadly venom to the present generation of the land, as it will be to the future.' Before concluding, reference should be made to a fallacious remark to be found in a recent number of one of our leading religious publica- tions to the effect that ' all who are advocates for the total prohibition of the use of opium, apart from medicinal pur- poses, to be consistent, should also advocate the total prohibition of the use of alcohol with only the same restrictions.' This does not follow ; the cases are not analogous : e.g. 1. Missionaries are almost unanimous in their condemna- tion of opium, but they are not so relative to alcohol. 2. The same remark applies to Chinese Christians, both as regards what they tolerate and what they do not tolerate. 3. The habit of taking opium is by far the most insidious one. 4. Opium is frequently used for the purpose of self- destruction, but alcohol is not so used. APPENDIX E. AN APPEAL. The anti-opium cause has now been before the public for many years. In 1891 special efforts were made, and an Urgency Committee formed to bring the question if possible to a speedy crisis. In December of that year I went to a demonstration in Exeter Hall under its auspices, which, as I hope to show, did not attract the notice it deserved. It was held in the large hall, was well attended, and grave allegations were made, which, whether false or true, as they accused our Government of encouraging the opium traflfic by a most questionable device, ought certainly to have been noticed by the press ; yet the next morning, on looking over three of our daily leading papers, I found that not a word was published in any one of them, either by way of report or protest Surely such a meeting should not be thus ignored. If the assertions were true, they should be made known by the press throughout the whole of England, and a vast majority of our countrymen would doubtless express the wish to blot out so great a national sin ; but if false and proved to be so, then the anti-opium party would very speedily collapse. Unfortunately, there appears to be a determination among a section of the press and others to ignore what is said at anti-opium meetings, and to uphold our sinful opium policy. This being so, every true Christian and philanthropist should investigate the subject for himself. Among my own friends, some assume the attitude of despair ; they say : ' Our opium traffic is no doubt very wrong, but you will never get the people of England to take -sufficient interest in it to stop it ; your efforts will all be in 146 ENGLAND'S GREATEST NATIONAL SIN. vain.' No ; we never shall if the Christian public fold their arms, lose their faith in the cause, and say, ' The task is a too difficult one.' This compilation has been to me, I can assure my readers, a labour of love, and I think that if it were freely circulated, it might, under the blessing of God, help in some measure to hasten the abolition of a great national sin. This, how- ever, will not be accomplished to the extent it might in the ordinary way, so cold are some, so indifferent are others, and so ignorant are the many on the subject, even among the educated. I therefore appeal to the readers of this book for sub- scriptions in order to widen its circulation by gratuitous dis- tribution; I contemplate chiefly forwarding copies (i) to the clergy of the Church of England ; (2) to ministers of other denominations. If the clergy of our National Church could be persuaded to take a practical interest in this matter, it would go some way towards its final solution, and one step towards that end which I have attempted in this compilation is that they should grasp the question. If any of my readers are of fhe opinion that this work may be a help in that direction, I shall be obliged by their kind co-operation, and would remind them, when considering the amount they will for- ward, to think of the very limited number who will read this appeal, and to remember that a generous effort to bring about a crisis on this question will be cheaper — to put it on the very lowest ground — than a continued less hearty sup- port. A donation, if desired, can be credited to either of the objects named. I purpose closing this subscription list at the end of 1893. The Lord will be no man's debtor. ' We lose what on ourselves we spend ; We have as treasure without end, Whatever, Lord, to Thee we lend. Who givest all.' Subscriptions should be sent to the author, the Rev. H. H. T. Cleife, The Rectory, Hardington, Yeovil ; or to the Yeovil branch of the Wilts and Dorset Banking Company ; to be credited to ' The Anti-opium Book Fund.' INDEX. The number following Author's name or referenu applies to the section. CHAPTER I. PAGE India and the Opium Trade i Our responsibility — Canon Wilberforce, I 7ke opium trade in British Itidia — David McLaren, J.P., 2 Ser majesty's initials on the opium balls — Mr. Moyle, 3 The presidency of India where opium is chiefly produced — Mr. G. Gillett, 4 Spread of the opium plague elsewhere under the British flag — ' Devastation of India's Millions ' (Appendix I.), S Degradation of British administratum atLucknow — ' Devastation of India's Millions,' 6 India tegan her trade with China, not by selling opium, but by giving it away — ' Devastation of India's Millions,' 7 Anti-Opium meetings and petitions — The Sentinel, 8 ; Anti Opium News, 9 A very serious charge — ^H. H. T. C, 10 The testimony of some missionaries — Anti-Opium, News, 11 Ravages of the opiufn plague in smaller cities — Dr. Morison, 12 An American missionary on the Government shambles — Rev. A. W. Prautch, 13 CHAPTER II. The Malwa States as affected by the Opium Treaties - 16 The opium treaties with the subordinate native rulers — Anti- Opium News (condensed), I 7j5« growth of the poppy in the Malwa district tnakes it the catuer of India — The Sentinel, 2; Mr. George Gillett, 3 10 — 2 14 INDEX. CHAPTER III. I' AGE BuRMAH — Our Relation with the Opium Revenue- 20 Lower and Upper Burinah — Regions beyond, I Lower Burniah, and its large opium revenue — ^J. L. Maxwell, M.D., 2 We accused King Theebaw of wholesale murder, but what are we doing? — Mr. George Gillett, 3 77ie testimony of some missionaries — Rev. A. T. Rose, 4 ; the late Dr. Duff, 5 An appeal from the Rangoon Missionary Conference — ^J. 1„ Max- well, M.D., 6' CHAPTER IV. China — The pernicious Traffic in this deadly Drug 26 Mr. Passmore Edwards on the Opium War — Mr. P. Edwards, i Britaitis crime against China — Canon Wilberforce, 2; Medical Missions at home and abroad — E. D., 3 China's view of the opium-traffic, past and present — Rev. W. S. Swanson, 4 France, China, and the opium traffic — Mr. D. Matherson, 5 Russia, China, and the opium traffic — Anti- Opium News, 6 Opium, is injurious to all classes — Mr. Alfred S. Dyer, 7 Who first introduced opiuvt into China ? — Dr. Dudgeon, 8 A most pathetic fact — Mr. Sowerry, 9 The Chefoo Convention — H. H. T. C, 10 The testimony of missionaries — Rev. S. Whitehead, 11 ; the venerable Archdeacon Moule, 12 ; Rev. J, W. Taylor, M.R.C.S., 13 ; the Bishop of Victoria, Hong-Kong, 14 A bird's-eye view of our dealing with China — H. H. T. C, 15 CHAPTER V. Opium and other demoralizing Narcotics sold in India 38 Hoio opium is prepared, and its immediate effects when smoked — Indo-Chinese opium trade, 1 Three pernicious effects of the drug — The Christian Women of Tung Chow, North China, 2 Opium requires to be administered very cautiously as a medicine — ' Bristol Methodism in John Wesley's Days,' 3 For every opium smoker several persons suffer grievous evils— Rev. George Piercy, 4 INDEX. 149 PACK Can the evils of opium smoking be exaggerated? — Sir Rutherford Alcock, K.C.B.,s Opium-eating and smoking. Which is worse ? — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 6 ; Miss Nainby, 7 Opium is easy to suppress — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 8 ; ' Devasta- tion of India's Millions,' g Ganja—Ui. W. B. Phillips, 10 Tht effects of ganja. ■ It is easy to suppress — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 11 A digression. Some American cigarettes are heavily impregnated with opium — Mr. Maurice Gregory, vz Atiother phase of the opium vice — Rao Bahadur Gopalrao Hari Deshmuk, 13 CHAPTER VI. Alcohol and Opium compared - - - - 5° Js opium- worse than alcohol? — ' Devastation of India's Millions,' I ; Dr. Grattan Guinness, 2 Three affirtnative answers — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 3 Dr. Maxivell on the physiological effect of opium — ^J. L. Max- well, M.D., 4 The testimony of missionaries — Rev. S. Whitehead, 5 ; Rev. F. W. Bailer, 6 ; Dr. Gauld, 7 The public-house and opium den compared — H. H. T. C., S ; W. S. Caine, M.P., 9; Dr. Morison, 10; Mr. Maurice Gregory, 11 Dens for gooli-smoking — Rev. W. B. Phillips, 12 Even little children are drugged in Chitiese and licensed Ituiian opium-dens — Mr. A. S. Dyer, 13 English men and woiyien are to be found in Melbourne opium- dens — The Deliverer, 14 CHAPTER VII. The Opium Trade from a religious point of view 63 The great responsibility of all Christians, to help put down this monster evil — Sir Arthur Blackwood, I It is useless to ignore our guilt — Sir Arthur Cotton, K.C.S.I., 2 Opium and the Gospel in China — Mr. J. H. Taylor, 3 Chinese Christians atid the ravages of the opium plague — Mr. Alfred S. Dyer, 4 I50 INDEX. The opium and the Gospel came together from England to China — An appeal from Canton Christians, 5 An appeal from the Pekin Anti- Opium Society — Numerous Pekin signatures (principally natives), 6 CHAPTER VIII. Important Testimonies - 69 Great ignoratue is the cause of much of the prevailing indifference on this subject — Sir Edward Fry, I ; Sir Arthur Cotton, 2 The moral law of nations — The late John Bright, M.P., 3 A very sad testimony — The unhappy Coleridge, 4 Mr. S. Smith, M.P., on our injustice to India — Mr. S. Smith, M.P., 5 Tke question had never been treated as a party one — Sir J. Pease, M.P., 6 An excuse: ' Consider titerevenue' — The late Archbishop of York, 7 Our Indian finances aiui tlie opium indulgence — Rev. C. H. Spur- geon, 8 We are told thai opium smoking is not worse than whisky drink- ing — The late Mr. Henry Richard, M.P., 9 ; Sir Thomas Wade, C.B., 10; Sir George Staunton, 11 Burmah ajulthe opium trade — Sir Charles Aitchison, 12 China and the Opium War — Mr. Gladstone, M.P., 13 Chinese noble sentiments — Keying, the High Commissioner, 14 We shotild dissolve partnership with China^s sin — Archdeacon Wolfe, 15 ; Rev. Griffith John, D.D., 16 ; the late Earl of Shaftesbury, 17 ; the late Mr. R. Montgomery Martin, 18 A reference to letters from several Bishops of the Church of Eng- land— Yi.. H. T. C, 19 What irony is there in the parody on Bishop Heber's beautiful hymn — ^Bishop Heber, 20 CHAPTER IX. Medical Opinions - - - 77 The testhno7ty of aii eminent physician — The late Sir Benjamin Brodie, I The testimony of an American medical missionary — Dr. D. W. Osgood, 2 Important testimony of tlie late author of the Chinese Materia Medica—V)t. L. Porter Smith, 3 INDEX. 151 I'AGE Tie testimony ofemitient medical missionaries — Dr. Dudgeon, 4; Dr. Little, 5 The leading English medical journal on the opium traffic — The London Lancet, 6 Quotations from other medical publications — The Medical Press and the Indian Medical Gazette, 7 The leading Indian medical journal on the opium traffic — The Calcutta Medical Record, 8 CHAPTER X. The Financial Aspect . 83 The Bengal opium revenue — Mr. David McLaren, J.P., and J. G. Alexander, LL.B., I TTie quantity of opium, used by persons in Bengal — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 2 The Bombay opium revenue — Mr. David McLaren, J.P., ^ The opium revenue and Indian finance — H. H. T. C, 4. Considerable economies might be effected in the civil service and military expenditure of India — Rev. Canon Wilber- force, 5 Section I. — The qttestitm from a ^ per contra ' aspect — Mr. George Gillett, 6 ; Mr. H. S. Newnham, 7 ; Eversham Journal, 8 Why do we keep so large a fleet on the China station ? — Rev. Septimus Hobbs, 9 Twenty years' trade ivith China atul Japan compared — Mr. S. W. Newman, 10 Section II. — The question from a moral point of view: The importance of the opium revenue discussed — Mr. B. Broomhall, II A business which is demoralizing China — The late Dr. Med- hurst, 12 The Chinese practise the golden rule of Confucius — Dr. Dudgeon, 13 History teaches that God punishes nations for their sins — Dr. Grattan Guinness, 14 A view of the case net always remeinbered — The Bishop of Madras, 15 CHAPTER XL Some Statistics Connected with the Opium Question 96 Retail prices of opium in India — Anti-Opium News, I 1 52 INDEX. I'AtiK Present consumption in India — J. G. Alexander, LL.B. , 2 Heavy hurease in the consumption of opium hi the Bombay Presidetuy — Anti-Opium News, 3 Reduction of the price of opium in tlu North- West Provinces of Oudh — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 4 Increased consumption of opium in the city of Luckrunu — ' Devas- tation of India's Millions,' 5 China! s annual opium bill — Extract from an appeal from the Chinese Christians at Canton, 6 The number of average medical doses forwarded from India to China every '■ good' year — Anti-Opium News, 7 Some statistical paradoxes explained — H. H. T. C, 8 CHAPTER XII. The Opium Trade is Fostered by our Government 102 Our Government only regard the opium traffic from a fiscal point of view — Sir Cecil Beadon, I Official statements as to the number of opium licenses require the most minute investigation — Rev. H. H. Daniels, 2 Another misleading official statement — Mr. Maurice Gregory, 3 Misleading statements in the House of Commons — The truth upon a momentous subject by two Indian Missionaries, 4 The Indian Budget deserves a more important place, and to occupy more time in onr hnperial deliberations — H. H. T. C, s We are encouraging the opium trade against the wishes of our Burmese subjects — ' Devastation of India's Millions,' 6 We are and have been iti different ways fostering the opium trade in China — Cardinal Manning, 7 CHAPTER XIII. Concluding Remarks - - 114 Where the real power of reform lies — The increased consumption of opium in Itidia — The duty of our government in the fcue of new facts — An Indian Veteran and others, i This question should be zealously kept outside the range of party politics — 'National Righteousness,' 2 We should ascertain the view of our catididate on this subject H. H. T. C. 3 The power of a hundred votes — Friend of India and Statesman, 4 INDEX. 153 I'AGK Let Its not delay — Anti-Opium Neius, 5 God is not mocked — Dr. Norman Macleod, 6 A national 7uarniii^ — David McLaren, J. P., 7 Summary — |, G. Alexander, LL. B., 8 t-Vill the Anti-Opium party ever be strong cnongh to carry ont their proposals?— Yi. H. T. C, 9 APPENDIX A. Some Objections Answered 123 Under General Objections — I to 4 Section I. — India, 5 to 10 ' Section IT. — China, 11 to 16 ( Compiled from various sources. ) APPENDIX B. Facsimile of First Part or a Bombay Opium License, with Explanation _^ 130 Anti-Opium News, I — A quotation from a Madras Presidency license— H. H. T. C, 2 Anti-Opium News, 3, 4 APPENDIX C. The Slave Trade a Century Ago, and the Opium traffic to-day 138 Anti-Opium News. APPENDIX D. Partial Victories 141 H. H. T. C. APPENDIX E. An Appeal - 145 H. H. T. C. THE END. Elliot Stocky Paternoster Ko-:'.', Londcii.