Nebraska advertiser. [volume] (Brownville, Nemaha County, N.T. [Neb.]) 1856-1882, 1856-11-01
BROWNVILLE NEMAHA COUNTY, N. T., SATURDAY


who held Macao. We did as they did.
The Jesuits led on the Portuguese,
and the East India Company intro
duced the English. The Portuguese
were aiming at the establishment Of
their superstition, we at the extension
-of our commerce; and we each pursued
our peculiar object, religious and com
mercial, per .fas ct ne fas. In plain
English, we wanted China as amarket-
place for the sale of our East India
produce, although the most gainful
produce was poison; but that mattered
not. Commercial conscience is not
scrupulous, and we eased our conscience
as well as possible by sending over
reinforcement of missionaries and
million of New Testaments. The
Papists baptize with sponges quickly
the Protestants evangelize with opium
in one hand and the Gospelin the other,
impudently; meanwhile, the East India
Company and the Board of Control
carry on their business after the old
fashion--the accursed thirst of gold
stupefes them, and draughts of the
precious narcotic stupefy also the poor
Chinese. General Alexander shows
how all this is DONE"
He tells us how the Indian govern
ment superintends the cultivation of
the poppy and the making Of opium.
The cultivators of poppy farms, he
states, are required to deliver in a GER
tain quantity Of opium to the agents
for their respective districts, who are
empowered to judge, in every case of
failure, to produce the tale prescribed,
whether this failure be the consequence
of willful neglect. The agent may
believe this to be the case, or he may
suspect it. The suspicion of the agent
is then his warrant to impose heavy
fine upon the ryot, who is utterly help
less and lies at the discretion of an
Indian who is directly interested in
oppression. The proprietor of land,
too, is required by another law to give
information against his tenant if he
suspects or believes the tenant to be
negligent; the proprietor who neglects
this duty is to be visited also with a
heavy fine, and swarms of policemen
and native officers are scrictly enjoin-
ed, under penalty of dismissal from
Office and severe punishment, to see
that all these informers do their duty
Torture, as we know, is one of the
ready instruments for extorting pay
ment of duties; and Imprisonment
with its tormenting horrors, awaits
each hapless object of suspicion in the
greedy eyes of agent, landlord, police
man, or any other officer. In case
however, thatfne or imprisonment has
been inflicted on an industrious ryot
falsely charged with negligence, the
law allows him a trifing pecuniary
compensation for the accident. And
as the production Of opium is carried
on by system of oppression worse
than that of the Egyptian task-masters
because aggravated by the condition o.
another system of refined injustice, SC
) its traffic is made the occasion of still
) further social corruption. SearcherI
are employed to hunt for concealed
parcels of the drug in the houses O
the ryots, who are all to be suspected
of having retained some part Of it fol
: private sale free of duty; and thi;
, business the searchers perform with Sc
much needless violence, and such dis
gusting intrusions into the apartments
of the females, that a respectable Hin.
doc, though he have not grain O
opium in his possession, would sacrifice
all he has in the world, rather thar
expose his wives to insult.
But still greater evil than the op
| preston ofthe natives-observeS MajOl
Alexander-is the rapid demoraliza
t ton of the vast population of India
l from the growing habit of opium-eat
$ ing. Even the Hindoos, said to be th'
|, most temperate people in the world
have caught the mania. In writer
communication received from Mr.. A
+ SYM, dated the 18th March, 1910, h,
states:
NThe health and morals Of the peo
t pie suffer from the production of opium
}, Wherever opium is grown it is eaten
d and the more it is grown the more it i
eaten; this is one of the worst feature
e of the opium question. We are de
moralizing our own subjects in India
: one-half of the crime in the opium
e districts-murders, rapes, and afray
n have their origin in opium-eatine
fsBoth Hindoos and MusSulnlans ca
I the drug; and its pernicious effects ar
d visible on the population of the opiur
districts, particularly in the neighbor
hood of the depots."
Itis important to remember that thi
= gentleman speaks Of wEat he ha
/ actually seen, during a long residene
ir in the opium district; he assured m
IF that all the other evils of the opiul
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