OPIUM IN THE FRENCH NAVY.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 19 June 1913, Page 4

OPIUM IN THE FRENCH NAVY.

The "Matin" has instituted an inquiry into the ravages of opium in the French navy. The results are staggering. All the great seaports are, it appeare, infected, |but Toulon, with 163 opium dens to Its sole account, is the chief plague spot. The opium and the opium-habitf alike come from the great French colony of Indo-China. Severn! years ago the Governor of Indo-China," seeking to check the evil at it a fountain-head, requested General Briere de I'lsle to deport from the colony all who were victims of tho" habit. "I.t is nothing less than the evacuation of Indo-China that yon ask of me," was the General's desolatory- reply. Once domesticated on Frenclusoil, the habit has taken terrible root. This is the picture which the Mayor of Toulon draws of his, city:—"Once everything bespoke life and vigour; there is now an atmo- j •sphere of lethargy, depression and 4

disease!. The *hoio external life of our city soonis io on dying. Our commerce and our industry are on the ebb." No lesci ominous is the statement of the Maritime Prefect, Admiral Bellue. . "The use of the drug has to-day spread throughout the youth of our navy with s uch pernicious subtlety that we must, at all costs, check it. It counts .many devotees even among the naval cadets of the Jeanne d'Aro, the hope and strength of our navy in the years to come. The young officer* smoke opium first out of snobbishness, because they think it a fine thing to do. Late? they do it of necessity, when the habit has them in its power."