Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  ") 
Jan.  2,  1871.  j 
Opmm  Trade  of  China. 
29 
at  first,  the  operation  of  this  edict  was  beneficial  to  the  trade  in  for- 
eign opium,  the  poppy  was  still  grown  extensively,  and  the  prohibition 
would  prove  ineffectual.  That  such  has  hitherto  been  the  result  is 
proved  by  the  fact  of  another  edict  having  been  issued  on  the  31st 
January,  1869,  redirecting  all  viceroys  and  governors  to  cause  procla- 
mations to  be  issued,  forbidding  altogether  the  cultivation  of  the 
poppy,  which  is  stated  to  have  been  introduced  from  Kan-suh  into 
Shen-si  and  Shan-si,  and  afterwards  grown  in  the  provinces  of  Kiang- 
su,  Honan  and  Shan-tung.  The  ground  of  objection  to  the  poppy, 
and  even  to  potato  culture,  stated  in  the  edicts,  is  that  they  withdraw 
land  from  the  cultivation  of  rice  and  grain. 
There  is  little  doubt  that  the  competition  of  native-grown  opium 
has  had  much  to  do  with  the  declining  price  of  the  foreign- grown 
since  1866,  and  that  at  the  same  time  the  increased  production  of 
the  native  has  lessened  the  importation  of  Indian  opium. 
At  Tien-tsin,  since  1866,  it  is  certain  that  a  yearly  diminishing 
importation  has  accompanied  a  yearly  falling  price,  plainly  indicating 
a  decreasing  demand  for  foreign  opium.  There  is  no  evidence,  how- 
ever, according  to  Mr.  Consul  Mongan,  of  the  decrease  of  opium 
smoking,  but  rather  of  its  increase ;  and  therefore  it  may  fairly  be 
inferred  that  the  quantity  of  native  opium  has  so  much  increased,  or 
its  quality  so  much  improved  of  late,  as  to  have  shut  out  a  considerable 
amount  of  the  Indian  drug.  This  inference,  too,  is  much  strength- 
ened by  the  reference  which  the  late  edict  makes  to  the  spread  of 
poppy  culture  over  northern  China. 
In  addition  to  the  provinces  enumerated  in  the  edict,  there  is  also 
ample  evidence  of  extensive  poppy  cultivation  in  other  parts  of  the 
Chinese  empire.  It  seems  to  have  been  carried  on  for  many  years  in 
the  extreme  south-west  in  the  province  of  Yunnan,  the  largest  portion 
of  which  has  thrown  off  its  allegiance,  and  is  now  a  practically  inde- 
pendent kingdom. 
Sze-chuen  has  also  been  for  many  years  a  great  poppy  province,  and 
the  drug  produced  there  very  perceptibly  afi'ects  the  market  at  Han- 
kow. When  Lord  Elgin  visited  that  city  in  1858,  he  stated  (Blue 
Book,  1859,  page  443)  that  he  saw  there  "  shops  where  native  opium 
was  openly  advertised  for  sale.  Mr.  T.  T.  Cooper,  in  some  notes  on 
his  travels  towards  India  through  Central  China,  speaking  of  Sze- 
Chuen,  says,  "  In  spring  the  country  was  white  with  the  flower  of  the 
opium  poppy,  now  one  of  the  staple  productions  of  the  province;'* 
