POPPY CULTURE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XII, Issue 4295, 19 August 1875, Page 1 (Supplement)

POPPY CULTURE.

To the Editor of the Hkrau>. Sir, —Observing in your to-day'a issue an article on the cultivation of the poppy and the growth of opium, X beg. to .hand you a sample of poppy capsules, commonly called " P°PPy heads," grown lost year at my place, at-the Bombay Settlement. They are not the finest which I grew there, a3 they are in point of fact the tail-end of the batch, I Laving supplied, my customers with the others in the ordinary course of business; but you- will observe that those I send you are at least equal in size, shape, and quality to ■ those usually imported front England, upon which we have until lately had to pay duty at the rate of 3s the cubic foot- . I am not sangine as to the production .of opium in this country, because while, .as*ypur.correspondent remarks, the value ofopiom is dependent entirely on the per-centago of morphia which it contains, experience teaches that soil and climate havo influence in the matter than the hand of man. It is the same with many,.if not most other drugs of vegetable origin. Still, it is evident that the poppy grows and comes to perfectionin this climate, and that with very little- attention from the grower. All the attention I bestowed upon them was to sow the seed at seed time, admire them daring growth, and cut them down and dry them afterwards.—l am, &c., Henry CLAVTejr, Pharmaceutical Chemist, Victoria-'str»efc. [The samples of poppy heads may be seen at our office.—Ed. N.Z.H.]