PEOPLE TALKED ABOUT

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXV, Issue 15, 14 October 1905, Page 2

PEOPLE TALKED ABOUT

The Opium Curse. While 100 people out of every 100 in Australia know that the opium evil exists, possibly not one in every hundred has an adequate idea of the awfulness and extent of it, remarks a writer in the “Review of Reviews.” Not only the great cities of the Commonwealth have their opium dens, but these foul places of iniquity are scattered from east to west, from north to south of our island continent in the smaller country towns, and, like some horrible cancer which slowly but surely spreads its tentacles through the body, and at last brings the whole of it within its malignant influence, the hideous vice is extending its feelers throughout the whole community, and tightening its death-grip. A. common mistake that a good many people make is to imagine that the Chinese are, in the main, those who are affected by the opium traffic; and because of this a good many people take little notice of the evil, imagining that, as in their belief it affects only the Chinese, and not the Europeans, it is not worth troubling about; as though the soul of one man was not as valuable in the sight of God as another. But this vain presumption must be scattered to the winds, for it is not by any means the Chinaman who is the only devotee at the opium shrine. Let the unbeliever go through the opium dens of Melbourne and Sydney, and the sight of the white women and the white men lying on the mats under the insidious influence of the drug, will appal him. Here is a very significant fact which ought to worm its way deep into the consciousness of every' man and woman. In spite of the fact that for a number of years the number of Chinese in Australia has been diminishing, the importation and consumption of opium is not, and the natural conclusion must be, and undoubtedly is, that the number of European smokers is increasing. Efforts, vain and futile, have at various times been made to get the opium traffic prohibited in Australia. Brave little New Zealand has already led the way in this respect, and prohibits the importation of opium, although the present Government shamefully permits a laxity of administration of the law: but now in Australia is a great light shining. May its beams have full opportunity to fly unrestricted throughout the whole Commonwealth. In the minds of some people in Australia the word “Chinese” is a synonym for immorals, but the Chinese Reform Leagues of Melbourne and Sydney are just now setting an example in morals that ought to bring a blush of shame to every European, and especially to every Christian worker, because of the glorious example they set to those who ought themselves be teachers of morals. The Chinese Reform Leagues are taking the matter up in downright earnest. They recognise the curse as such, if the European community does not, and all Christian Australia is under an everlasting debt of gratitude to fhe Chinamen who are lifting up the banner of righteousness and stepping out boldly on the road of reform. A meeting of the Chinese Reform League in Sydney was hold the other day to point out to the Federal Government the extent of the opium evil, and to suggest the prohibition of the drug. What an inversion of that which should be! The movement is not local. It started in Melbourne with the Chinese Reform League, and has spread to Sydney and the other States. So rapidly has it caught on in the sister city that it seems as though the efforts of the child are going to outdo those of the parent. One of the most ardent spirits in connection with the prohibition movement in Victoria is the Rev. C. H. Cheong, a highly cultured and refined Chinese gentleman, a notable linguist, and a minister of the Church of England. For over

twenty years he has been working for the prohibition of the drug, and the history of Mr Cheong is the history of the movement. In 1889 a determined attempt was made, through his efforts, to bring the matter to a head, and the then Minister of Customs, the late Sir James Paterson, was approached. He showed a warm interest, and published a lengthy report of an interview with him in the Press, and otherwise interested himself prominently in the matter. Then the Hon. William Anderson and Mr W. J. S. Gordon (chairman and secretary, respectively, of the Temperance Party in Parliament) joined Mr Cheong and his coworkers. The Hon. Alfred Deakin was deputationised, and was sympathetic. Then, in 1890, Mr Cheong was invited

by the Victorian Alliance to speak at its annual meeting on the opium question. A large and thoroughly enthusiastic audience in the Melbourne Town Hall cheered his speech to the echo. The speech was printed in the “Alliance Record.” and was reprinted by the “Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade” in England, and as a consequence Mr Cheong was invited to the United Kingdom to address public meetings on the question. Then, in 1891, he organised a large and representative deputation to wait on the Premier, the Hon. James Munro, with the result that a bill was introduced into the Victorian Parliament prohibiting the importation and use of opium, other than for medicinal pur-

poses. Through the energetic efforts of Mr Gordon the bill passed the Assembly by an overwhelming majority. But the Upper House, which has so often proved the grave of social reform, caused the measure to be deferred for twelve months. It is said that the Hong Kong Opium Farmer’s agent in Melbourne left no stone unturned to secure the defeat of the measure. Large sums of money were spent. Some £3OOO were said to have gone for that purpose The anti-opium party, however, was not discouraged. In 1893 another large representative deputation waited upon the then Premier, Sir James Paterson, and he immediately brought in a measure for the suppression of the evil. By an even larger majority than the last an almost

unanimous House, this bill passed the Lower Chamber, but it was sacrificed among the innocents in the Upper House. t)ij this second occasion, when the measure so nearly succeeded in passing into law, the Hongkong Opium Farmer’s agent is alleged to have spent a much larger sum than before to defeat it. Then came Lord Brassey, with his sinister influence, chairman of the Royal Commission on Opium. Personally interested in the opium traffic, and deriving a huge income therefrom, while acting as chairman of the Commission, he was indefatigable in doing everything to defeat the object of the reformers. He even succeeded in prevailing upon a brother commissioner, at heart against the infernal traffic, to vote with him, interviewing him on several occasions, and succeeding at last in coaxing him to sign the majority report 'f the Royal Commission, although the man was convinced more than ever, after a visit to India, of the terrible nature of the evil. The ridiculous question which Brassey put to his brother commissioner was, ‘"Would he, for the sake of sentiment, sacrifice the Indian Empire, which depended upon the revenue from the opium traffic?” Sacrifice the Indian Empire, indeed! Better to sacrifice it if its preservation to the Crown depended on evil. A farcical question from a grown man. and one that ought to have had no weight, but it did, and Lord Brassey’s presence in the viceregal residence in Victoria, and the active party spirit he had shown against it, made any efforts in connection with the anti-opium movement for a time futile. At a public meeting in the Assembly Hall certain gentlemen questioned Lord Brassey’s fairness in connection with the opium business, and were cried down by the meeting, an index to the general stupid idea that it was bad form to disagree with a izovernor, and to advocate a reform that he was opposed to. Forsooth! Then, two or three years ago. Mr. Josiah Rowntree, a former member of the House of Commons for Scarborough, and a chairman of the representative committee of the Anti-Opium Society of England, visited Victoria. He would have been a potent force in reviving interest in the movement, but for the regrettable fact that he was mistaken for Mr. Joseph Rowntree, whose vagaries upon the temperance question made him unpopular with Australian reformers. Fiesh interest, however, is now being taken in the movemen!, and seeing that it is being prosecuted so vigorously by the very people who are most intimately concerned with it financially, the battle must be pressed to the gate. It will be a pitiable neglect of duty if the Federal Government carelessly puts the plea aside. None desire the prohibition of the drug more than those who are slaves to it. One night among the opium dens of Melbourne. in company with one of the sisters who spends her life in trying to reclaim the fallen inhabitants of the slums, a splendid physical specimen of a young Australian, smoking on one of the mats, hailed me and wanted to know why we

did not stop the supply of the drug, and pathetically said that if a petition to the Government to prohibit it were circulated amongst the smokers, every one of them would sign it. As a matter of fact, a European smoker, hearing that the Chinese Reform League in Melbourne were taking the steps we have indicated, waited on the league, and asked that lie should be accompanied to a den where a number of smokers were anxious to sign the petition to the Federal Government Eleven of the smokers, all Europeans, men and women, attached their names to the petition. To be saved from themselves, that is the prayer. Will the Federal Government, for a little paltry financial gain turn the cry aside? It is appropriate to mention here that a strong movement is on foot in New Zealand to educate the public mind on the grievous wrong inflicted on China by the British Government forcing the Indian opium upon that country. May the movement prosper! In order to aid the efforts of the Chinese Reform Association a meeting of interested Europeans is io be shortly convened. The active cooperation of all our readers is earnestly solicited.