150 OPIUM 



south-west of Ireland are the only places in the British Isles 

 where it will grow out of doors without shelter. 



OPIUM. Lathi Opium, from Greek opos, vegetable juice. 



Corn poppies, that in crimson dwell, 

 Called Headaches, from their sickly smell. 



JOHN CLARE (1793-18C4). 



This quotation refers to the common red poppies which 

 blossom in our cornfields, but opium is the dried juice of 

 the White Poppy, Papaver somniferum. 



Incisions are made at sunset in the unripe capsules, 1 or 

 seed-vessels, of the poppies, and by morning the milky juice 

 has hardened into a kind of brown gum. This gum is the 

 opium of commerce ; it has an earthy, drowsy smell, and 

 a bitter taste. 



Opium is one of the most precious of all drugs, for it con- 

 tains an element which induces sleep and relieves pain. 

 Morpheus was the Son of Sleep and the God of Dreams, and 

 the element in opium which produces sleep and insensibility 

 to pain is therefore called morphia, or morphine. Though 

 a very valuable medicine, opium is very harmful if used 

 in temperately. 



The white poppy is cultivated in England chiefly in Lincoln- 

 shire, and is found growing wild in various other places in 

 England, but its narcotic 2 properties are not so strong as 

 when grown in warmer climates, and most of our opium is 

 therefore imported. 



In India the white poppy is extensively cultivated in the 

 Ganges Valley, and on the Malwa Plateau. Ghazipur and 

 Patna are the collecting centres in the Ganges Valley, and 

 Calcutta the port of shipment. The produce of the Malwa 

 Plateau is exported from Bombay. Unfortunately most of 

 this opium is sent to China, where large numbers of the popula- 

 tion are addicted to the vice of opium smoking. 



All parts of the poppy, except the seeds, contain a certain 



1 Capsules : Latin capsula, a little box or chest. 



2 Narcotic : Greek narkotikos, from narkoun, to benumb. 



