30 
Opium  Trade  of  China. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Phaem. 
I     Jan.  2, 1871. 
and  Mr.  A.  Wylie,  the  well-known  Sinologue,  who  has  travelled 
lately  in  the  same  province,  says  in  a  letter,  "  One  fact  I  can  vouch 
for,  and  that  is  the  widespread  use  of  the  drug,  and  consequent 
degradation  of  the  people.  It  was  pitiable  to  see  the  victims  of  this 
practice  coming  to  us  to  ask  for  relief  and  desiring  to  be  cured,  and 
such  were  by  no  means  confined  to  the  lower  classes.  I  believe  the 
practice  in  Sze-chuen,  as  elsewhere,  is  very  widespread  among  the 
literary  and  governing  class.  From  all  the  information  we  could 
gather,  it  commenced  in  this  province  within  twenty  or  thirty  years 
past.  In  the  '  Statistical  Account  of  Sze-chuen,'  published  in  1817, 
which  gives  a  detailed  list  of  the  productions  of  the  province,  the 
poppy  is  not  named.  I  do  not  remember  seeing  any  foreign,  though 
it  is  sold  there,  but  at  every  market  the  farmers  bringing  in  their  little 
lumps  of  native  production  were  always  to  be  met  with.  As  far 
as  I  could  learn,  the  price  ranged  from  140  to  250  cash  the  tael 
weight." 
Another  vast  region,  not  mentioned  in  the  edict  of  1869,  in  which 
poppy  culture  has  been  spreading  rapidly  within  the  last  few  years,  is 
Eastern  Mongolia  and  Central  and  Northern  Manchuria,  the  drug 
thence  brought  down  to  the  coast  competing  with  Indian  opium  in  the 
Newchwang  market.  Thus,  in  the  provinces  of  Yunnan,  Sze-chuen, 
Shen-si,  Kansuh,  Shan-si,  Honan,  Shan-tung  and  Kiang-su,  as  well 
as  in  Manchuria  and  Mongolia,  native  opium  is  produced ;  and  that 
its  consumption  by  the  Chinese  is  lessening  the  demand  for  the  Indian 
drug,  would  seem  to  be  indicated  by  the  fact  that  in  1868  the  total 
importation  of  the  latter  was  less  than  it  had  been  in  1867  by  4789 
chests,  representing  a  value,  at  the  average  ruling  rate,  of  nearly  two 
millions  sterling. 
These  figures  are  given  in  a  letter  that  was  published  in  the  North 
China  Daily  News  of  the  22d  February,  1869. 
Native  opium  sells  in  Tien-tsin  at  from  125  taels  to  200  taels  per 
picul  less  than  Indian,  and,  though  nominally  prohibited,  it  pays  a 
similar  local  duty  to  foreign.  Opium  is  brought  into  Tien-tsin  either 
crude  or  prepared.  When  in  the  former  state  it  is  generally  spoken 
of  as  "tu,"  earth  or  clay,  from  its  outward  resemblance  to  lumps  or 
cakes  of  common  clay :  and  the  native,  as  distinguished  from  the 
foreign,  which  is  termed  "yang-tu,"  or  foreign  earth,  is  called  "hsi- 
tu,"  or  western  earth — a  name  that  has  clearly  a  geographical  refer- 
ence to  the  producing  provinces.    (Consular  Reports,  No.  2,  1869.) 
