THE OPIUM PROBLEM.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIV, Issue 9697, 5 March 1910, Page 7

THE OPIUM PROBLEM.

Particulars of Ivthe {[Chinese fight against opium have a special interest in view of the Conference on the Opium Question, to take place before long. Last year the first resolution of the International Commission at Shanghai recognised “the unswerving sincerity of the Chinese Government in the work of suppressing the ufio of opium." Id a report recently drawn up by Mr Max Muller, Councillor to the British Legation at Shanghai, it is stated that there has been undoubtedly a very sensible decline in consumption and cultivation since ■ the initiation of the movement three years ago. Among the officers of the Chinese Army, the habit of opium smoking has been entirely abandoned, About eighttenths of the people in Pekin have stopped smoking; though the officials, being constrained chiefly by the Imperial decree and by their liability to a periodical examination, have a wa y of relinquishing the drug for a short time, and relapsing into old ... . * _ _ A. I nvt {fl

habits as soon as the inspection is safely past. Anti-oplom pills, which form the solace of more than half the reformed smokers, represent another triumph of the guileful poppy. They mean that the manner of taking opium has been changed rather than the habit subdued though in this form it seems to satisfy the narcotic craving without having such disastrous effect as when the pipe is used. Opium dene, of coarse, are forbidden by law, though many exist in secret; and opltun pipes have no open sale. If personal enthusiasm has its limits, still the progress made has been very considerable since war was declared against the “foreign smoke." Three years ago the crusade began with dramatic holocausts. As Savonarola once had his bonfires of “vanities” in Florence, so the mandarins would piletena of thousands of opium pipes in pyramids to be consumed amid the tumultuous acclamation of a Pekin orowd. The God of War at Lienkong saw his temple thronged with honourable and great personages, who inaugurated a “league for the putting away of poison,” But the evidence of earnestness and sincerity depends less on snob emotional scenes than on the patient, steady selfsacrifice whioh has entirely freed many districts from poppy growth. Moreover, during the years of reduction, says Mr Max Muller, “a publio opinion has been formed,” to strengthen the hands of the Government and the provincial authorities in the more drastic measures that are to come.