The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1889-01-21
Opium and the chinese.

Few who realize the yet unended troubles
that African slavery has brought upon TINS
nation, will be disposed to doubt tnat the
misdoings of people are as sure to be pun
ished in these days as in the days Oh the
Chosen People. Abraham Lincoln's forcibly
expressed foreboding that for every drop OF
blood drawn by the lash another might De
required by the sword seems to bear within
it a universal principle as well as the truth
full statement of a particular incident. A
forcible and interesting Illustration OF this
old truth is furnished by recent paper pub
| Iished by an English officer Of the Chinese
government. Many years ago China wished
| TO exclude from her people the opium OF
India. She attempted it; but England, at
the point of the bayonet, compelled her to
desist, and tnenceforth the balefui product
of the poppy farmers of India flowed in in
increasing quantities to the self indulgent
native OF, China. Some people in England
have said this was the shameof their coun-
try and the disgrace of Christendom. But
others have condemned them for their 'fussy
scrupulosity" and when the agitation has
been taken into Parliament it has been ridi-
culed, being characterized even so late as
1886 by the leading newspaper of England
as an ''amiable attempt to pass sumptuary
laws for the Chinese Empire" What an
absurdity, to discourage the cultivation of a
crop from which ten millions of subjects in
India gained a living, and from the tax upon
which revenue Of fifteen million dollars
flowed annually into the ex chequer Of the
Viceroy of India, simply because percen-
tage, though very large percentage, is ulti-
mately misused by the consumers. The
House Of Commons had quite enough to do
quite enough to look after without exer-
cising grandmotherly supervision over
the morals of the natives of
China. Well. few years have rolled
by; the poppy farmers of India have con-
tinued to prosper after their own way; the
Indian exchequer has enjoyed the yearly
revenue; the statesmen of China have grad
ually ceased to fret over the havoc the opium
habits making among their people. But for
few years that revenue has been decreas-
ing, at first only a little, at last with dis
Quieting rapidity. AT first it was thought
that the Chinese might be getting tired of
the seductive drug, or that, by spasm of re-
form, or by the forming and keeping Of good
resolutions, they nigh be breaking away
from the habit. But the most careful inves-
tigation shows that this is not the fact. The
propensity which is understood to have to-
tai existence in China of 10 more than a
short century, has of recent years spread like
wildflre among the nation. In the great
province Of Szechuen, containing 70 millions
Of people, 1t is estimated that seven tenths
of the adult male population are smokers.
Probably twenty-five per cent only had con-
tracted the habit quarter of century ago.
Why is it. with this great increase of the
vice that there is not a greater demand for
the opium of lndia9 The poppy farmers of
Bengal ought to be getting richer year by
year, and the exehequer Of India ought to be
more prosperous than ever. Instead of this
the reverse is tue; and there Is possibility,
even probability. that before many years
the Chinese market will cease to be profit
able. The Chinese have become skilled in
the production of opium and are supplying
the drug to their own people. The business
of raising ruin for heathens who should look
out for themselves is menaced with destruc-
ton. OF course this single instance Of re-
tribution that is yet only in prospect can
not be plead as proof positive that the wick
ed flourish only for season. 1t is merely
an impressive instance of the truth of that
saying, which to the minds of large part
of mankind has already been proved over
and over again.