CHINA, AND OPIUM.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 170, 11 April 1908, Page 4

CHINA, AND OPIUM.

Yesterday's cable news contains further ■■ information 'concerning ; the Chinese Government's campaign against the opium habit. The Government, it is reported, is making an energetic attempt to , reduce the consumption of the dnig. . ..A rigorous prohibition has been issued'against its iise in schools and the army; enquiries are being made as to' th 6: "extra smoking amongst .officials'and people"; ; and refuges are to be established; for the treatment of victims. TJntil-quite recently the opium-bond-age of China \tas generally considered j by those Europeans who took an interest in the question, only as an unhappy stain upon the honour of Great Britain, which forced the drug upon the Chinese nation. Lately, the question has taken on a new aspect, and the anxiety of the Chinese Go-' vernment to rid the Empire of a great evil cannot be . thought of apart from .the "awakening of China," a phenomenon of the very greatest moment to the Western peoples. By , an Edict issued in June, 1906, it ; was "commanded that within a period of ten years the evils arising from foreign' and native opium be equally, and completely. eradicated," and this Edict the Chinese Government intends to see obeyed in spite of-the fact that by treaties_ drawn up in 1842 and 1858 China is deprived of the right to exclude the drug. The British Government and the Indian Government have so far modified these treaties as to agree to, a diminution of the Indian opium-export. The Chinese Government has gone ' very thoroughly to work; the poppy areas are restricted, licenses for opium dens are suppressed, a rigid system- of inspection has been established, heavy taxes have been placed on dens and shops, and shops have been opened for the sale of antiopium medicines. i While it is impossible to withhold the admiration due to this determined attempt to sweep away an evil which, more than anything else, has kept China a chained it is impossible also to look unawed upon the possibilities of - a' great nation of 400,000,000 people freed from the drug/and bent upon coming abreast of the front ranks of civilisation., An English p,iper recently had this curious comment upon the campaign against the drug: "Speculation as to what might happen if instead of opium, which induces inaction, ■ a drug were popularly consumed 1 in China which induced accesses of nervous energy may be recommended to, those who see in the mysterious East a perpetual menace ,to the West." It is not necessary to carry speculation so far. China free from opium will be sufficiently formidable without the aid of a tonic that will make the nation super ; instead of subnormal. Tho opium-pipo has been the

most powerful ally of those who fear a modern China, for the nation has been in bondage to the drug- in a degree for which there is no parallel. The expiration of the decade of de-narcotisa-tion prescribed by the 1906 Edict will mark beginning of a new phase in world-politics.