252 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



dantly that there is a great deal more than our over- 

 sapient Horatios have been or are disposed to admit 

 in the instinctive use, by mankind, of certain sub- 

 stances such as alcohol, tobacco, opium, and Indian 

 hemp, the deleterious effects of which can be very 

 easily pointed out and enlarged upon by a cheap 

 philanthropy, which, too often, has its own exaltation 

 as its chief motive power, as also by a pure and un- 

 selfish sympathy with the sufferings of the human 

 race, which, starting from certain most dubious 

 premises, will not wait for the light of science. 

 Hence, merely as an honest writer, I am quite in- 

 disposed to dogmatise on this subject of the use of 

 opium in the East. The use of the drug is often 

 destructive ; but there is no element of support, 

 medicine, pleasure, or advantage of any kind in the 

 world, which is not liable to shatter the vase into 

 which it is poured; and the greater the advantage, 

 the more risk is there of the earthen vessel being 

 shattered by it. On this occasion I had before me the 

 authority of Colonel Walker himself, the pacificator 

 of Kathiawar, who has laid it down (in his despatch 

 to the Governor of Bombay, of the 15th May 1808) 

 that " from the banks of the Indus to the ]\Iahee, 

 opium is universally considered among all the natives 

 of the country as the emblem of hospitality and the 

 seal of friendship. Opium is invariably offered to 

 every stranger as the pledge of welcome, which it is 

 neglectful to omit and impolite to refuse." 



