HISTOKK AI. NOTK. 23 



18. 



In the work called ir//-//-/<\/n-.M/ ( //i (fa g *J |jj), written at the end of the 

 MIM. dynasty and the beginning of the present, it is said of the Poppy that it is 

 sown in the middle month of autumn, at noon. After flowering, the seed vessel 

 grows into the shape of a vase. The tiny seeds can be eaten as porridge. Oil is also 

 obtained from them, and the capsules are useful in medicine; they are powerfully 

 ;usti indent. When the capsules are still green, if a needle be used to puncture 

 them in 10 or 15 places, the sap will come out. This should be received into an 

 cup, which may be covered carefully with paper pasted round the 

 edge. Let the cup be exposed to the sun for 1 4 days ; it is then Opium, ready 

 fin tringent, and restrains reproduction most powerfully. 



19'. 



Carefully weighing what is said in the passages preceding, it appears plain 

 that from the latter part of the fifteenth century the manufacture of Native Opium 

 \t-.(^ existed in China, and it is not only in recent years that there has been both 

 Native and Foreign Opium in this country. Let the reader examine the various 



nits nt' the manipulation by four different authors. WANG Hsi's book cannot 

 now he procured, but judging by what is quoted from him in Li SHIII-CIIKN'S work, 

 hr ii to describe the method of Poppy culture in Arabia, and spoke particularly 



of a kind which yielded the Opium sap in the 7th and 8th months or later. When, 

 however, he speaks, as in the passage translated from the Tunrj-i-pao-chien, of 

 obstinate diarrluca needing Opium to cure it, and advises the physician to make 

 < )pium direct from the Poppy in a way which he describes, he must be speaking of a 

 Chinese made article. Li T'ING'S account differs in too many points from that of 

 WAM; Hsi to be regarded as a second-hand statement based exclusively upon it. 



. then Li T'iNc is a third and independent witness on this subject, the fourth 

 the author of the work Wu-li-hsiao-shih. 



aoMrM 



