The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1884-08-15
ORIENTAL OPIUM SLAVES.
VISIT TO AN OPIUM SMOKERS DEN
IN CHINA.
An American Tells what He saw
There-The Methods of the smokers
Graphically DESERT 81.

A letter from China describes a visit to
a Chinese opium den. The writer says:
The smoker lies curled up, with his head
resting on bamboo or earthenware
pillow about five inches high. Near him
stands an opium lamp, the flame of
which is protected by glass shade low
enough for the point of the flame to pro
ject above the top of the shade. The
smoker take, a wire and dips it into Il
little box containing prepared opium.
A small quantity adheres to the point of
the wire, which is then held over the
flames of the lamp until the heat has
swelled it to about ten times its original
size. This is rolled over and over on the
flat side of the clay bowl, the opium all
the time adhering to the wire. When it
has turned to soft, solid mass it is
again applied to the lamp, and this alter
nate roasting and rolling is kept up for
at least ten minutes, by which time it is
in the shape of "A pill and ready for use.
The aperture in the pipe is so small that
it can only receive the smallest quantity,
and the most careful manipulation is
needed to transfer the tiny ball of opium
from the end of the wire to the bowl of
the pipe. The point of the wire is
inserted into the hole of the pipe
and worked round and round
till the soft opium forms into a conical-
shaped ring around The wire. BY twist
ing the wire the drug is gradually de-
tached from it, leaving hole through
the opium about as large as the hole in
the pipe bowl, with which it communi-
Gates. The pipe is now ready and the
bowl is held over the lamp so that the
opium comes in contact with the flame.
ASpluttering noise ensues as the smoker
sucks at his pipe. After each successive
draw he elects from nose and mouth
volume of smoke, the very smell of which
is enough to turn horses stomach. BY
the end of the fourth or fifth Whit the
pipe is empty. The smoker now scoops
out another dose of opium, rolls it into
pill and repeats the operation with the
same patience as before, and smokes
away until the pipe falls from his hands
and he is lost in dreamland, One thing
is very certain, that if tobacco smoking
were only half the trouble tobacconists
would soon have to shut up shop.
After little while we turned corner
and passed into a back ROOM Here
were the same scenes, the same filth, the
same withered faces and the same splut-
tering of opium pipes. These seemed to
be secret smokers who had gone here TO
avoid detection, where there seemed to
be every facility to evade the search of
their friends. We are not surprised to
find in this room mere youths, who,
Judging by their silken robes. must be-
long to wealthy families, and who were
here beginning a career which must end
.tn1t, nt,I Il IN Il,
den we were surrounded by half a dozen
emaciated looking objects, who implored
us to give them medicine to cure them.
Every foreigner in China is believed to
be god to kill and make alive. He has
a great reputation as medicine man.
We were fortunately able to direct the
poor fellows to the missionary hospital,
where they could get weaned from the
drug. One man told us that he had
smoked for thirty years; that his physi-
cal energies had clean gone and he was
fast becoming wreck. He spent three
fourths of his family earnings at the den,
and the craving was become so intense
he feared that before long all his money
would go in opium. 1t is only very
common example where a wife of a Young
family will toll early and late to support
an opium smoking husband and father.
A beginner has only to pay two or three
visits to the den, and the place has
wonderful fascination for him. Three
weeks smoking, at a couple of hours per
day, and the man, left to himself, is
bound slave to the pipe as long as he
lives, held down by chains stronger than
iron, from which only death can release
him.