ON THK HABITUAL USE OF OPIUJf 
6(5 
of Opium. The sum total consumed in Opium monthly will thus be 
about % 34,824. 50 cts. or yearly ^417,884. 30 cts, giving a 
monthly expenditure to each Opium smoker of <§? 2. 31, cts. 
If we contrast this dreadful vice as existing in Singapore with 
other places we will be surprised to see how fearfully we are ahead. 
According to the census of 1845, the last that was taken, there’were 
of male and female Chinese 32,132, while the entire population was 
57,421. At present the calculation I should say would be correctly 
stated as 65,000 for the entire population of the island w r ith about 
5000 more at a floating population of strangers either in Junks or 
prows and the inhabitants of several of the small islands adjacent to 
Singapore. Of this 70,000, 40,000 must be considered as Chinese. 
Remembering that the number of Opium smokers amounted to 
15,043, this will give one for every 4, of the population at large, 
but if we confine ourselves to the Chinese alone, who are the princi¬ 
pal consumers, then w r e have one in every three, and amongst the adults 
a little more than one in every two ? Perhaps this awful proportion 
of persons given up to this vice may not strike the reader as great, 
from having - been told of the universal adoption of the habit by the 
inhabitants of this island, but the same has been said of China, and 
what do w r e find there? that in 1845, 40,000 chests were consumed, 
and allowing 3 candarlnes of pure extract to each man which is about 
the same quantity of Chandoo and Tinco, which I have proved each 
opium smoker on an average Ases in Singapore, there will be 3,000, 
000 of Opium smokers in that vast empire, a number that is suffici¬ 
ent to astonish him who is not acquainted with the subject, but great 
as this number is, the proportion of Opium smokers in China com¬ 
pared with the inhabitants, only is as 1 in 133, reckoning the popula¬ 
tion at 400,000,000. But if the habitual use of Opium w 7 as carried 
on to the same extent in China as we have it in Singapore, there 
would be 92,307,692 Opium smokers where at present there may not 
be more than 3,000,000. 
In Java and Madura the following is a correct statement of the 
quantity and value of the Opium farmed by Government for several 
successive vears. 
