THE DRUG HABIT.
CHAPTER VII.
Opium.[1]
It may be taken for granted that most people are in some degree acquainted with the use of opium, having had it at some time or other administered to them as a medicine. Dover’s powder, so useful a remedy for a cold, contains opium; Laudanum is a preparation of it which is familiar to everybody; and there are scores of other remedies and proprietary preparations which contain opium to a greater or less extent. But useful as opium may be, it must be used with discretion, and must not be allowed to change its character of a faithful servant for that of a master. It can become an exacting and dominating master, and the habit once formed is well nigh ineradicable.
For the information of those who have not seen the pure drug, I may mention that opium is a dark brown, putty-like substance with an agreeable, sweetish, odour. It is the dried resin obtained by incising the unripe capsules of a certain variety of poppy, and is prepared in large, well-equipped factories, from which it is issued in cakes and balls weighing eighty tolas.[2]
The opium industry is a Government monopoly. The poppy crops are grown under Government supervision, and the factories where it is prepared belong to Government and are staffed by Government servants. The prepared product is sold from Government opium shops from which consumers who are so privileged can get their requirements at a certain fixed price.[3] But as is the case with all monopolized commodities, opium may assume a money value far in excess of its intrinsic worth and be sold for its weight in silver. In fixing the price of opium, Government is confronted with a choice between two courses: either to sell opium cheap, and so extinguish the smuggler; or to prohibit it entirely and thereby convert India into a happy hunting ground for the avaricious and rapacious fortune hunter. It takes a middle course, therefore, and sells opium at such a rate that facilities for obtaining it are reasonable, without, on the one hand, rendering it cheap and easily obtainable, or, on the other, making it prohibitive. The policy pursued is one of eventual suppression; the discouragement of recruits to the opium habit being the means employed as best adapted to bring about its realization.
The opium habit was an established thing in India centuries before the British first set foot in the country, and it is surmised that it was the Arab conquerors, who invaded India in the 11th century who first introduced it. The cultivation of the poppy, and the preparation of opium, were live industries in India in the 16th century, as Portuguese chroniclers tell us, and when the British East India Company took over the administration of Bengal after Clive’s victory at Plassey in 1757, all that they found themselves able to do was to adopt a policy of regulation leading to ultimate suppression. This policy has been followed ever since.
It is a fundamental weakness of human nature that we desire most that which it is most difficult to obtain. It is a perpetuation of the genesiac myth of the forbidden fruit; and no matter how optimistic some may be that the opium habit will eventually be stamped out, it is to be feared that this cannot come about until human nature ceases to be what it always has been. This contention applies with special cogency to the opium habit whose insistence in our midst is not only owing to the fact that it satisfies the sensuousness and voluptuousness which forms a part of every man’s nature, but that it establishes a dominance over its victims which requires almost super-human power of will to overthrow. In a letter to his friend and medical attendant Mr. Gilman, Coleridge, who was for twenty-five years a victim to the opium habit, writes about the giving up of it as a “trivial task” and as requiring no more than seven days to accomplish; yet elsewhere he describes it pathetically, and sometimes with almost frantic pathos, as the scourge, the curse, the one almighty blight which had desolated his life. De Quincey very justly calls this a “very shocking contradiction,” and asks, “Is, indeed, Leviathan so tamed?”
It has been more than once suggested that the dissemination of a healthy propaganda would be the best means of deterring recruits to the opium habit, and that reliance upon the efforts of a strong preventive staff can result only in a diminution of the vice, and not its extinction. On some, such propaganda might have the desired effect; but with others, it may have just that effect which we seek to avoid. There is always a desire to experience new and strange sensations; there are always some who want an unfailing panacea for pain of body or mind; there are always some who long for oblivion. All these things are to be got from opium—the sovereign panacea for pain, grief, “for all human woes”; a weaver of dreams and ecstasies! And so, with the personal equation always solving itself, the problem remains to all intents and purposes unsolvable.
Let us see what the effects of opium are. A writer on the subject says, “A small dose not unfrequently acts as a stimulant: there is a feeling of vigour, a capability of severe exertion, and an endurance of labour without fatigue. A large dose often exerts a calming influence with a dreamy state in which images and ideas pass rapidly before the mind without fatigue, and often in disorder, and without apparent sequence. Time seems to be shortened as one state of consciousness quickly succeeds another, and there is a pleasant feeling of grateful rest. This is succeeded by sleep which, according to the strength of the dose, and the idiosyncrasy of the person, may be light and dreamy, or like normal profound sleep, or deep and heavy, passing into stupor or coma. From this a person may awaken with a feeling of depression, or langour, or wretchedness, often associated with sickness, headache, or vomiting.” I have verified these statements by questioning numerous consumers of opium, and, in substance, their descriptions tallied exactly with that I have quoted.
How the opium habit is first contracted is a matter which deserves investigation, but it would seem that the most fertile cause is its injudicious administration in its character of an anodyne. De Quincey, in his “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater” tells us that he first took opium for a severe toothache. The poet Coleridge, who, like De Quincey, was a confirmed opium-eater, “began in rheumatic pains”; and if a census of consumers was taken, it would not be surprising to find that eighty per cent. of them were first introduced to this “dread agent of unimaginable pleasure and pain” by its being given them for a stomachache, toothache, or some such wrecker of the peace of their mind. The other twenty per cent. are the victims of curiosity. The Burman is said to get the taste for opium when he is drugged with it while young, when he is, according to Burmese custom, tattoed from the waist to above his knees.
Nobody needs to be told that a habit is formed by the frequent repetition of acts or indulgences, and that some habits are more difficult to break ourselves of than others. The opium habit falls in this category. It is formed, of course, in the same way as other habits, but there are peculiarities connected with it on which those who are ready to condemn opium-eaters as degenerates might well ponder. The physiological effects of opium are such, that the wearing off of the effects of a dose are attended with the keenest mental and physical distress. No one who has not been an opium-eater can describe these adequately. The need, therefore, for a corrective of this condition becomes what seems an urgent necessity, and the only immediate corrective is “a hair from the dog.” A succession of these “hairs”—and a not very long succession—forms the habit. Unlike other habits, it is a habit that cannot be cured without immense strength of will, and a readiness to undergo great suffering: pains in the body, diarrhœa, and a general upset of the mental equilibrium. We see, therefore, that the cause of the habit lies here: the need for opium to alleviate the pangs caused by opium.
An Excessive Opium Smoker
Amongst unromantically inclined people of the type who form the bulk of consumers—cultivators, coolies, artisans of all kinds, humble folk whose creed is “pice and rice”—it would be difficult (and ludicrous) to suppose that their object in taking opium is to go in their dreams to:
“Woods that wave o’er Delphi steep
Isles, that crown the Aegian deep,
Fields that cool Ilissus’ laves
Or where meander’s amber waves
In lingering lab’rinths creep.”
Possibly, they do have pleasant dreams; but the exertion and hard exercise they must undergo to earn their daily bread is known to counteract the sedative effects of opium; and as they take small quantities only, its effect is to stimulate them rather than to make them dreamy and sensuous; and I contend that, primâ facie, it is not to evoke sensuous imaginings that these people take opium. They take it because they cannot get away from it, once the pain to ease which it was given has passed. What strength of will do we expect to find in an unlettered cooly?
Without any apology I reproduce here some verses which appeared in 1894, about the time when the Royal Opium Commission came to India:
THE OPIUM-EATER’S SOLILOQUY.
They began by mourning over my degraded moral state,
Then my physical decadence they would anxiously debate.
Then they raised a pious eye,
And they heaved a pitying sigh,
And they shuddered as they pondered on my melancholy fate.
Now, I never had reflected on the matter thus, at all,
For my luxuries were few, and my expenditure was small.
I was happy as the day,
In my own abandoned way,
Till they said they must release me from the bonds that held me thrall.
I’d been cheered up at my Chandoo[4] shop, for years at least two score,
To perform my daily labour, and was never sick or sore;
But they said this must not be;
So they passed a stern decree,
And they made my Chandoo seller shut his hospitable door.
Now they’re sending out Commissions with the philanthropic view
Of inducing us to part with sev’ral crores of revenue;
For all opium traffic’s sin,
And, although it brings in tin,
Our nefarious trade papaverous, they say we must eschew.
Who’d have thought that my redemption would have cost so many lakhs
(For they saddle their expenses on my fellow-subjects’ backs).
What with deficits to square,
And Commissions everywhere,
On the “hoarded wealth of India” I shall prove a heavy tax.
If I’d only cultivated, now, a taste for beer or gin,
Or had learnt at Pool or Baccarat my neighbour’s coin to win,
I could roam abroad o’ nights,
And indulge in these delights,
And my soul would not be stigmatized as being steeped in sin!
But as mine’s a heathen weakness for a creature-comfort, far
Less pernicious than their alcohol, more clean than their cigar,
They have sent their howlings forth,
From their platform in the North,
And ’twixt me and my poor pleasures have imposed a righteous bar!
CHAPTER VIII.
Opium Smoking and Opium-Eating.
There are two modes of taking opium. It is either eaten in its crude form, or it is clarified with water and smoked in a pipe of peculiar construction.
It is generally conceded that opium smoking is less injurious than opium eating, bulk for bulk, of the amount consumed, and that the intemperate or immoderate opium smoker is less liable to the toxic effects of opium than the man who eats it raw. Why this is will be clear when it is explained that as a result of the process of preparation for smoking it, which consists in boiling opium with water, filtering several times, and boiling it down again to a treacly consistency, a considerable portion of the narcotine, caoutchouc, resin, and other deleterious elements are removed, and this prolonged boiling and evaporation have the effect of lessening the amount of alkaloids in the finished product. The only alkaloids likely to remain in the prepared opium, and capable of producing marked physiological effects, are morphia, codeia, and narceia. Morphia in its unmixed state can be sublimed; but codeia and narceia are said not to give a sublimate. But even if not sublimed in the process, morphia would, in the opinion of Mr. Hugh M’Callum (Government Analyst at Hong Kong), be deposited in the bowl of the pipe before the smoke reached the mouth of the smoker. The bitter taste of morphia is not noticeable when smoking opium, and it is therefore possible that the pleasure derived from smoking opium is due to some product formed during combustion. This supposition is rendered probable by the fact that the opium most prized by smokers is not that containing the most morphia.
But what constitutes moderation or the reverse? The answer is idiosyncrasy, or the degree of toleration. This is a factor which is lost sight of by most of those who declaim against the occasional glass or pipe. They wish to push temperance to the point of total abstinence, and condemn the man who takes a peg of whisky without evil results, with the man who becomes maudlin after taking a single glass of white wine, for it is only by outward appearances they are able to judge. But leaving them to rage in their ignorance, we must recognise the fact that opium is one of those drugs the effects of which depend largely upon personal idiosyncrasy and toleration. Dr. Chapman, in his Elements of Therapeutics, gives two instances of remarkable cases of toleration of opium. In one, a wineglassful of laudanum was taken by a patient several times in the twenty-four hours; and in another, a case of cancer, the quantity of laudanum was gradually increased to three pints daily, a considerable quantity of crude opium being also taken in the same period!
The usual dose, as a medicine, is from one to three grains of opium, but a consumer can take from ten to twenty, while I have met many able to take from sixty to eighty grains. The degree of tolerance is increased by usage and habit, and the tendency is to increase the dose with habituation. With smokers, it is not uncommon to find Chinamen, the heaviest consumers of opium in the world, who can dispose of three tolas[5] of opium in the day; but they smoke it, and so can stand far more of it than if they ate it in the crude state.
The reader who has troubled to come so far with me will not unreasonably be curious to know how opium is smoked; so, if he will accompany me farther, I will take him into a den and satisfy his curiosity. It is a Chinese den. From the street it has nothing to proclaim its character; it is like any other entrance in the street. Ah! Here comes a smoker. Observe his deathly pallor, his appearance of emaciation, his dazed expression. He must be a heavy smoker, soaked in the vice. Let us go in with him! We enter. For a moment the dimness of the room flanked on three sides with raised wooden platforms waist-high, and covered with mats, is accentuated by our sudden entrance from the sunlit street. We become aware of a peculiar odour in the atmosphere of the room, not unpleasant, but peculiar. It is like nothing that we have ever sniffed before. It is the odour of smoked opium. When our eyes, having got used to the light, or rather darkness, of the room, we look round and see on the platforms, sleeping forms sprawled round trays containing their smoking utensils. Let us examine these: First there is the pipe. It is made of a single joint of bamboo about a foot and a half long, hollow, and closed at one end, and about an inch in diameter. About a quarter of its length up from the closed end, there is an earthenware protuberance, not unlike a door-knob in appearance, firmly fixed into the stem; on its top, and in the centre, is a small orifice. This is the pipe-bowl.
Opium Smokers’ Appliances
Next we notice a lamp. This has a base of wood, and consists of a glass reservoir of oil, with a string wick leading from it through a small brass cap. Over this is a glass chimney.
Then we see the wire, like an ordinary fine knitting needle; and several horn phials, each containing prepared opium.
Preparing to Smoke Opium
(The opium on the end of the dipper being roasted over the lamp.)
But here is the new-comer whom we followed in. He has paid the den-keeper the small fee which makes him the temporary owner of a tray of smoking utensils, and with these he passes us, and getting on to the platform between two sleepers, he puts his tray down, and assumes a recumbent attitude beside it. Lying on his left side, with his head on a hard lacquered pillow, he draws the tray towards him and takes the pipe in his left hand. With the other hand he takes the piece of wire, and plunges one end of it into the horn phial containing treacly prepared opium, withdrawing it immediately with a drop of the fluid adhering to the point. This he maintains on the point by rapidly twirling the instrument between two fingers, and carrying it over the flame of the lamp, he proceeds to roast the opium. This is a delicate operation, and requires practice. The needle is dipped into the phial again and again, and the opium adhering to the end roasted over the flame until an appreciable quantity of the drug has accumulated on the end of the wire. He rolls this accumulation, still on the end of the dipper, on the flattened top of the pipe bowl, until it has acquired the desired shape, and then thrusts the end into the orifice in the centre of the bowl, and twirling the wire sharply round, withdraws it, leaving the opium in the orifice. Now, taking the lower end of the pipe in his right hand, and the mouth end of the pipe in his left, he applies the open end to his lips and holding the bowl almost inverted over the top of the lamp begins to take long inhalations, the smoke escaping through his nostrils. The little plug of opium in the orifice crackles and burns in the heat of the flame, and we notice that the smoker now and then scrapes towards the orifice in the bowl, all the particles of opium which remain unburnt. He finally clears the orifice by thrusting the wire into it several times, and disconnects the bowl from the stem. We notice it contains an appreciable quantity of black, evil-smelling opium residue. This is the “dross,” carefully preserved by smokers, and later on boiled with raw opium to which it is believed to add strength. We watch him smoke a few more pipes, and eventually the pipe falls from his nerveless hands, and he lies still. What are the dreams which flock through his mind? We do not know, but Bayard Taylor in his book India, China and Japan tells us of his personal experience of the effects of opium smoking. It was his first and last attempt, and his record is interesting. He says:—“To my surprise I found the taste of the drug as delicious as its smell is disagreeable. It leaves a sweet, rich, flavour, like the finest liquorice, upon the palate, and the gentle stimulus it conveys to the blood in the lungs fills the whole body with a sensation of warmth and strength. The fumes of the opium are no more irritating to the windpipe or bronchial tubes than common air, while they seem imbued with a richness of vitality far beyond our diluted oxygen.
“Beyond the feeling of warmth, vigour, and increased vitality, softened by a happy consciousness of repose, there was no effect until after finishing the sixth pipe. My spirits then became joyously excited with a constant disposition to laugh; brilliant colours floated before my eyes, but in a confused and cloudy way, sometimes converging into spots like the eyes in a peacock’s tail, but oftenest melting into and through each other, like the hues of changeable silk. Had the physical excitement been greater, they would have taken form and substance, but after smoking nine pipes I desisted, through fear of subjecting myself to some unpleasant after-effects. Our Chinese host informed me that he was obliged to take twenty pipes in order to elevate his mind to the pitch of perfect happiness. I went home feeling rather giddy, and became so drowsy, with slight qualms at the stomach, that I went to bed at an early hour—after a deep and refreshing sleep, I arose at sunrise, feeling stronger and brighter than I had done for weeks past.”
Chinaman Smoking Opium
CHAPTER IX.
Some Observations on the Opium Habit.
It is now proper that we should ask the question “Is opium the very dreadful thing it is made out to be?” My answer is, yes and no. Anything immoderately indulged in is bad for one. Over-eating, excess in smoking and drinking, are all bad. There is such a thing as too much of even a good thing. I am prepared to admit that excess in opium is worse than most things; but as a choice between opium and drink, I consider drunkenness to be the greater evil. It may be that it is more common, and therefore responsible for more distress in the world than opium; but opium does not, and can never, degrade as drink does, and a man does not make a beast of himself with opium. It does not make a nuisance of a man; it does not lead to violence and to murder as drink does. I do not ask reformers to subscribe to this view. I express it as my own opinion, founded as it is upon close acquaintance with numerous opium consumers, and many drunkards.
What is it that reformers have to urge against opium? They will not admit that opium in moderation does no great harm; they will not agree that the degree of toleration varies in people. Let us take their contentions seriatim, and see how they will stand against logical and informed discussion:
They say: (1) That opium in any degree induces physical degeneration.
I say, I have met men of wretched physique who are opium consumers, and men of wretched physique who are not opium consumers. Also, I have met giants in strength who are not opium consumers, and giants in strength who are confirmed opium consumers. I will also say this, that among the hard-working class of Indians and Burmans, such as coolies and porters, the proportion of consumers to non-consumers is about equal, but I have been able to observe no inferiority in capacity in the consumers, and very often have found them superior. Those who wish to learn what the powers of bodily endurance of an opium consumer may be are recommended to read that very readable book “An Australian in China.”
(2) That the consumer is mentally inferior to his non-consuming brother.
This I qualify. It depends on the degree of indulgence, and unless this is considered, it is not possible to argue. It is a proved fact that the effect of opium is to quicken the perceptions, and stimulate the imagination. Too often this is taken to be evanescent; and it is assumed that the intellect weakens, and that, eventually, it is enfeebled beyond chance of recovery. But if opium were not taken; in such a case, would not advancing years bring about a like condition? Charles Lamb, who drank more than was good for him, and Coleridge, who was an opium-eater, complained that the effect of their particular “poisons” was to deprive them of their capacity for singing when they awoke in the morning! Lamb complained of this when he was forty-five, and Coleridge at the age of sixty-three. Does anyone imagine they would have been able to “revive the vivacities of thirty-five” if they had been always temperate men?
There is no doubt that, taken in large quantities, opium induces a sluggishness, a lethargy, a stupor; but does not an unusually heavy meal induce a torpor which is incompatible with any sort of intellectual labour? I hold only with moderation.
(3) That indulgence in opium weakens the character and morals.
This applies with equal force to immoderation in most things. It does not hold good of opium taken in moderation. To affirm this is a clear indication of ignorance of the subject. Why, in the name of all that is extraordinary, should a moderate dose of opium make a man a thief, or a criminal, or a moral imbecile? Indians and Burmans, whose religion forbids all manner of intoxicants, condemn their opium-eating brothers to a sort of social ostracism, and when asked for a reason, say, “It is against our religious tenets; and it is very bad in every way.” Such uninformed statements are excusable in the unenlightened, but what of those who ought to know, and who pride themselves upon their education and reasoning faculties? They are as clamorous against opium and other things in a more censurable ignorance of facts. Some who will not clear their minds of cant, declaim against a glass of wine with all the fervour and denunciation of fanatics, without rhyme, reason, or apprehension of what they are talking about. In their more fluent and exuberant way, when pressed for a reason, they tell us in effect that indulgence in opium is “Against our religious tenets, and it is very bad in every way.” It is time reformers recognised that opium is not such a dreadful thing after all, and confined their attention, and devoted some of their ample leisure, to winning back those who have gone over the limit of moderation, instead of anathematizing them.
It is a pity that reformers do not pursue their propaganda along reasonable and obvious lines, because they would have more supporters and helpers if they did. To publish fulminatory pamphlets against the opium evil, without having any experience of it at first hand beyond an occasional hurried visit to an opium den, is worse than futile; and they cannot hope to convince those who are really in a position, and qualified to help them in their efforts. This is due to a profound ignorance of facts, and a lot of people in India are responsible for the dissemination of a lot of ill-digested nonsense. An enthusiast visits an opium den and finds half a dozen Chinamen sprawled around, with as many opium pipes. He does not know that these men have come in from a ten-hour day’s work. He throws up his hands in pious consternation, and writes home about the dreadful place he has visited, and of the horrors of intoxication he witnessed there. The vividness of his description is modified only by the amount of rhetoric at his command, and no one who has come into contact with this sort of person will deny that he always has a vast store!
I once met a missionary, and in the course of conversation, we happened upon the opium evil. He was eloquent, his views on the subject were decided. In fact he was so decided in his views that I found it impossible to convince him that what he described as the effects of opium were really those symptomatic of an overdose of bhang. And yet, I have little doubt that this person must have written home lurid accounts of the opium evil, and the ruin and havoc it was causing. What reformers ought to do is to cease memorializing Government to totally prohibit the traffic, and try to help them more by taking an active part in checking immoderation. Moderate indulgence in opium is less harmful in every way than the habit of passing public resolutions and submitting memorials.
By the foregoing, I do not wish it to be surmised that I hold a brief for the opium habit, or that I consider it a desirable thing. To be a slave in any degree to anything is bad; the tobacco habit is bad; the over-eating habit is bad. But opium comes in for too much of the attention of religious propagandists, and the Government is taxed with the charge of reaping revenue at the expense of the bodies and souls of the people. This is a view it is the duty of anyone who knows the subject intimately to correct. The Royal Commission on Opium in India, which sat under the chairmanship of Lord Brassey, some thirty years ago, collected a mass of evidence for and against opium which is unrivalled in its extent and value. The conclusion come to by a majority of the Commissioners was that opium in moderation did no great harm; and to ensure moderation, they recommended a policy of close control. In deference to popular opinion, and the religious scruples of the bulk of Indians, they thought it desirable that the opium habit should eventually be suppressed, and trusted that close control would, by attrition, bring about this result.
CHAPTER X.
Morphia.
Morphia, which is the active principle of opium, is interesting in its being the first “alkaloid” to be discovered. Its basic nature was first noticed by Serturner in 1816.
As a medicine, principally as an anodyne, morphia is to pharmacy what chloroform is to surgery, and, as a “boon and blessing” to man in that character, it is second to none. But like all good things in this world, it has become the object of the grossest abuse at the hand of man; and its devotees, in an euphonic sense, number hundreds of thousands.
Morphia is a narcotic; that is, it “has the power to produce lethargy or stupor which may pass into a state of profound coma or unconsciousness, along with complete paralysis, terminating in death.” The degree of insensibility depends upon the strength of the dose; one-sixth of a grain for an adult man, and one-tenth of a grain for an adult woman, being the largest safe dose given hypodermically. Two or three grains given by the stomach is dangerous. But, as with opium, the dose varies with idiosyncrasy, and some can tolerate larger doses than others. With habituation, some persons can take with impunity an amount of morphia which would prove fatal to five or six healthy, full-grown men. To have its full effect as an hypnotic or anodyne—and its power as the one depends upon its potency as the other—morphia must be given hypodermically.
The possession of morphia by people other than medical men and chemists is prohibited by law; and the rules governing its sale by chemists are rigid and exact. They must account for every grain sold, and all entries in their sales registers must be supported by prescriptions signed by qualified medical men. Yet morphia injecting is more prevalent in cities than the public is aware of; and it does not require a very penetrating mind to discover that the morphia used by its unfortunate victims comes from illicit sources—from the smuggler. There are, of course, unscrupulous physicians, dentists, and quacks, who pander to the cravings of some of their “patients” by administering regular injections; but we are dealing here with the type of persons who do not call in doctors, accommodating or otherwise. The ones I write about are catered for by an organization which, in spite of the greatest efforts, has been found to be unrepressible.
Group of Morphia-Injectors
How do these people get their supplies? Let us go into a morphia den unofficially, and take a glance at it in all its sordidity. We draw aside a filthy sheet of cloth which does service as a curtain, and enter a room about twenty feet square. It is dim almost to darkness; but at the farther end, opposite the entrance door, we notice a wooden partition which has a locked door in it, and near it a hole not unlike the window of a box or ticket office. Through this hole a light is seen, so we presume that there is someone behind the locked door in the partitioned-off portion of the room. Looking round us, we see a row of human figures, clad in the foulest rags, lying along the two sides of the room, near the walls. Some are apparently asleep; actually, they are drugged, overcome by the last injection of morphia. Others are about to make themselves comfortable for a sleep, having just had an injection; while some, too poor to afford the cost of another dose, are groaning and whimpering with the combined agonies of some painful disease, and the wearing off of the effects of the last injection. These accost everybody that enters the den for the price of “just one little injection.” They appeal to those who have endured the same pangs with which these unfortunates are wracked. The appeal is to a real, live sympathy; and if it can be spared, the required money is handed over.
One of these beings has not appealed in vain to a fellow votary who has just entered the den in company with two companions, and the four make their way to the hole in the partition, and in exchange for the coppers handed in, a skinny hand passes out four little paper packets, each one containing a dose of morphia powder. Let us peep through the hole, and look at the owner of the skinny hand before following the four to the place to which they have retired. It is a Chinaman, characteristically lean, sitting at a rough table on which is a cigar box filled with paper packets similar to those we saw being handed to the late purchasers. The red and green ones contain morphia, the white cocaine (for he caters for both classes, the injecters of morphia, and eaters of cocaine). Looking up at the hole, he sees us, and thinking we are either excise or police officers, he hastily gathers up his wares, and rushing to the sanitary arrangement in the corner of his cubicle, empties them into the receptacle, and pulling the chain, flushes away the incriminating evidences of his occupation. Being assured that they are well on their way to the sea through the sewer, he turns towards us with a “smile that is child-like and bland,” and explains that he has “got nothing—all gone—you can’t do nothing.” We explain that we had no intention of doing anything, and were merely curious. Recollecting that he had heard no call from his ever watchful colleague who stands by to give timely warning in the event of a raiding party coming in sight, he admits that he has been precipitate; but in no way disconcerted, he sends his colleague off to some place best known to themselves, for a fresh supply of packets.
We now return to the four men who provided themselves with morphia two or three minutes ago. We find them sitting in a ring round another fellow who we learn is the operator. He possesses a hypodermic syringe. Let us take and examine it. It is not the sort of thing one would expect to find in a chemist’s show-case or a medical man’s pocket-case. This is a weird instrument; the barrel a length of glass tubing; the plunger a bit of knitting needle, whose plunging head consists of tightly wound rag, and whose other end is topped with a conglomerate of sealing wax and sewing thimble. Both joints are lumps of sealing wax, through the lower of which an inch and a half of hollow needle projects. Handing back this septic instrument to the operator, who, by the way, tells us that he gets a copper for every injection he gives, he proceeds to empty the contents of the packets into a small china egg-cup. Adding a modicum of water, and stirring the mixture until a clear solution is formed, he takes up some in the syringe, and one of the expectant waiters draws nearer him. A search is made by the operator for a clear spot on the body of the man, where a dirty needle has not already penetrated and caused a foul sore, and after some search such a spot is found, on the palm of the hand, and here the needle is introduced, and the contents of the syringe discharged, after which the man operated on limps away to his place, and lying down, is soon asleep. The next draws near, and having received his share of the dose with the same needle, unsterilized and unwashed, he in turn limps off; and so with the others.
Let us hope that the fell, loathesome, unnameable disease, from which one at any rate of the four was too apparently suffering, has not been introduced into the blood of the others by that death-dealing needle! But it is a hope that we cannot think is justified; the means of propagation employed are too certain to admit of any hope!
The foul and fetid atmosphere of the crowded room is almost overpowering, in spite of the strong tobacco we smoke in our well-lit pipes, but we will linger a little longer and take a glance at those who are lying around like so many logs. Look at this one of them. What an object lesson he is to impetuous youth! Thin to emaciation; his hair fallen off in tufts; his nose almost eaten away; his body covered with sores and ulcers. There is nothing to wonder at in this being taking morphia to ease his pain of mind and body. Since death will not come, let him have oblivion. It is better so.
Here we find a woman; she is a slattern if ever there was one. Clean-limbed, in the sense that she has no sores on visible parts of her body, she is nevertheless almost as certain a disseminator of disease and misery as the foul needle. She wakes as we watch her, and in a drowsy way, smiles; probably in a way she means to be fascinating, but we are not under the effects of the delusive narcotic, so cannot be expected to know! Suddenly a look of intelligence comes into her eyes, and realising who we are, she gets up, and stumbles towards the door, and out on to the street—on her way to another den in all probability!
An Indian Morphinist
Here is another. An old, or rather, an old-looking man, shrivelled and feeble. He is just awaking from his stupor. We ask him to get up, but he is unable to do more than humbly indicate the reason for his inability to do so. A glance, as the sheet which covers him is withdrawn from his body, sends a thrill of horror through us, and we turn away sickened at the sight; and the man—is he a man?—draws his cloth over his tattered body, and tries to woo sleep again. This last sight is enough to send us headlong into the fresh air and sunlight. If these are the results of morphia, then God have mercy upon its votaries, for they stand sorely in need of it!
Morphia is imported into the country in large quantities by smugglers, the drug being brought from the British Isles, Japan, and the Continent by members of the crews of steamers plying from these countries. As many as 500 ounces of morphia have been seized in one consignment, and, as it is generally admitted by those who are in position to know that for every ounce seized, a pound passes through undetected, it only requires a simple calculation to arrive at the approximate total quantity which is hawked about unrestricted.
Morphia, being more portable and concentrated, is more easily concealed than opium, which is comparatively bulky. Of the aggregate seizures in any one year, seventy-five per cent. is made up of numerous small seizures. To seize four or five ounces of the drug in one lot is rather the exception than the rule; and seizure in larger quantities is a comparatively rare event.
But it is comforting, in a way, to know that morphia, by the time it reaches the consumer, is very often freely adulterated, starch being the adulterant used; and when it is considered that morphia sold illicitly fetches from five to six times its price when sold licitly, the increase in its bulk which results after adulteration represents a handsome additional profit to the vendor. The big smuggler imports the drug; his lesser brother buys some from him and adulterates it; the den-owner buys the mixture from the lesser light and he in turn adds a little more starch to it; and finally “the man in the cubicle” retails the mixture to the consumer.
There is little to be said in defence of the morphia habit. It is bad, utterly bad, in itself, while it is a fertile disseminator of disease when injected as it is. Morphia ruins a man, body and soul. As is the case with opium, pain is a frequent originator of the habit, but its hold upon the individual is, if anything, stronger than that exerted by opium, and fatal consequences ensue with great certainty and rapidity.
CHAPTER XI.
Cocaine.
In writing about cocaine, we find that interest lies not so much in itself as in the plant of which it is the alkaloid, the “erythroxylon coca.”
The coca plant is indigenous to Peru, and from the most ancient times, Peruvian Indians have chewed the leaves as a habit, as Indians in this country chew the betel leaf and tobacco. “The local consumption of coca is immense,” says Dr. Hartwig, “as the Peruvian Indian reckons its habitual use among the prime necessaries of life, and is never seen without a leathern pouch filled with a provision of the leaves, and containing besides a small box of powdered, unslaked lime. At least three times a day he rests from his work to chew his indispensable coca. Carefully taking a few leaves out of the bag, and removing their midribs, he first masticates them in the shape of a small ball, which is called an acullico; then repeatedly inserting a thin piece of moistened wood like a tooth-pick into the box of unslaked lime, he introduces the powder which remains attached to it into the acullico until the latter has acquired the requisite flavour. The saliva, which is abundantly secreted while chewing the pungent mixture, is mostly swallowed along with the green juice of the plant.
“When the acullico is exhausted, another is immediately prepared, for one seldom suffices. The corrosive sharpness of the unslaked lime requires some caution, and an unskilled coca chewer runs the risk of burning his lips, as, for instance, the celebrated traveller Tschudi, who, by the advice of his muleteer, while crossing the high mountain-passes of the Andes, attempted to make an acullico, and instead of strengthening himself as he expected, merely added excruciating pain to the fatigues of the journey.”
The poet Cowley succinctly describes the physical effects of coca in the following lines:
“Our Varicocha first this coca sent,
“Endow’d with leaves of wondrous nourishment,
“Whose juice succ’d in, and to the stomach tak’n
“Long hunger and long labour can sustain
“From which our faint and weary bodies find
“More succour, more they clear the drooping mind,
“Than can your Bacchus and your Ceres join’d.
“Three leaves supply for six days’ march afford
“The Quitoita with this provision stor’d
“Can pass the vast and cloudy Andes o’er.”
“It is a remarkable fact,” Dr. Hartwig tells us, “that the Indians, who regularly use coca, require but little food, and when the dose is augmented, are able to undergo the greatest fatigues without tasting almost anything else.” Professor Pöppig ascribes this astonishing endurance to a momentary excitement which must necessarily be succeeded by a corresponding collapse, and therefore considers the use of coca absolutely hurtful. Tschudi, however, is of opinion that its moderate consumption, far from being injurious, is, on the contrary, extremely wholesome, and cites the examples of several Indians who, never allowing a day to pass without chewing their coca, “attained the truly patriarchal age of one hundred and thirty years.”
The effects of excess in coca chewing are given by Hill in his Travels in Peru and Mexico. “The worst that can be said of the coca is its effects upon the health of such of the Indians as use it in excess. It then affects the breath, pales the lips and gums, and leaves a black mark on either side of the mouth. Moreover, after some time, the nerves of the consumer become affected, and a general langour is said to give plain evidence of the sad consequences of excess.”
Another writer gives a more depressing picture of the excessive consumer: “The confirmed coca chewer, or Coquero, is known at once by his uncertain step, his sallow complexion, his hollow, lack-lustre black-rimmed eyes, deeply sunk in the head, his trembling lips, his incoherent speech, and his stolid apathy. His character is irresolute, suspicious, and false; in the prime of life he has all the appearances of senility, and in later years sinks into complete idiocy. Avoiding the society of man, he seeks the dark forest, or some solitary ruin, and there, for days together, indulges in his pernicious habit. While under the influence of coca, his excited fancy riots in the strangest visions, now revelling in pictures of ideal beauty, and then haunted by dreadful apparitions. Secure from intrusion he crouches in an obscure corner, his eyes immovably fixed upon one spot; and the almost automatic motion of the hand raising the coca to the mouth, and its mechanical chewing, are the only signs of consciousness which he exhibits. Sometimes a deep groan escapes from his breast, most likely when the dismal solitude around him inspires his imagination with some terrific vision, which he is as little able to banish, as voluntarily to dismiss his dreams of ideal felicity. How the Coquero finally awakens from his trance, Tschudi was never able to ascertain, though most likely the complete exhaustion of his supply at length forces him to return to his miserable hut.”
The coca plant has from ancient times been the object of religious veneration by the Peruvian Indians, and although we have no historical record to tell us when the use of coca was introduced, or who first discovered its peculiar properties, we learn that when Pizarro destroyed Athualpa’s Empire, he found that the Incas employed coca in their religious ceremonies and sacrifices “either for fumigation, or as an offering to the gods. The priests chewed coca while performing their rites, and the favour of the invisible powers was only to be obtained by a present of these highly valued leaves. No work begun without coca could come to a happy termination, and divine honours were paid to the shrub itself.”
“After a period of more than three centuries, Christianity has not yet been able to eradicate these deeply-rooted superstitious feelings, and everywhere the traveller still meets with traces of the ancient belief in its mysterious powers. To the present day the miners of Cerro de Pasco throw chewed coca against the hard veins of the ore, and affirm that they can then be more easily worked—a custom transmitted to them from their forefathers who were fully persuaded that the Coyas, or subterranean divinities, rendered the mountains impenetrable, unless previously propitiated by an offering of coca. Even now the Indians put coca into the mouths of their dead, to ensure them a welcome on their passage to another world; and whenever they find one of their ancestral mummies, they never fail to offer it some of the leaves.”
It is believed that the superstitions regarding coca were looked upon with great disgust by the Spaniards, and that their efforts to stamp them out did more to keep alive the enmity borne them by the Indians than anything else.
The coca plant was first grown in Ceylon in 1870 when it was introduced from Kew. It was grown there as a result of a suggestion made by Mr. Joseph Stevenson who pointed out the commercial importance of the plant in view of the separation of the alkaloid cocaine by Nieman in 1859; but owing to the liability of the coca leaves to rapid deterioration after picking in unfavourable climatic conditions, this branch of commerce has not developed, and as yet no attempt has been made to extract the alkaloid in India, in commercial quantities at any rate.
But no matter what might be said about coca-chewing, there can be no two opinions about the dire and destructive effects of cocaine the alkaloid, and the results of indulgence in this drug are truly deplorable. It may be owing to something else in the coca leaves which ameliorates the full effect of the alkaloid; in fact it must be so, because I doubt whether even a confirmed cocaine consumer could find anything to say in its favour.
The first notice of cocaine consuming appears to be that of Col. J. Watson, who wrote in the New York Tribune about cocaine-sniffing. He writes: “I have visited some of the Negro bar-rooms in Atlanta, and the proprietors told me that the cocaine-habit which had been acquired by the Negroes, was simply driving them out of business. When the cocaine-habit fixes itself on a person, the desire for liquor is gone, the victim finding entire satisfaction in sniffing cocaine. By sniffing cocaine up the nostrils it reaches the brain quicker, and the effect is more lasting than if swallowed or administered by hypodermic injection. Persons addicted to the habit say they have tried the two latter ways, and that the effects are not the same, nor do they afford the same degree of satisfaction and pleasure as when sniffed. Unquestionably the drug rapidly affects the brain, and the result has been that, in the south, the asylums for the insane are overflowing with the unfortunate victims. After a person has habitually used the poison for a certain length of time, he becomes mentally irresponsible. No man can use it long and retain his normal mental condition. It is a brain-wrecker of the worst kind.”
Cocaine is a highly poisonous narcotic, and when rubbed on the skin, or injected under it, deadens the surrounding parts, and renders them insensible to pain. It is therefore much used in minor surgery, and in ophthalmic and dental operations. As such, it replaces chloroform to some extent. But, unfortunately, its highly stimulating effects, and its power to allay hunger, have been taken advantage of by many thousands of people who have made a habit of taking it, and Col. Watson’s description of the dire results of cocaine-sniffing apply with equal force to those which supervene on cocaine-injecting and cocaine-eating, vices that have spread with alarming rapidity all over the civilized world.
The cocaine-habit is an unmixed vice. There is no excuse for it; not even the excuse that the opium and morphia habits have, viz., accident; and the person who takes to it, does so wilfully and deliberately. Cocaine has a greater power over its votaries than either opium or morphia; the after distress is keener; and a slave to it is a slave indeed. And the harm it does, and the certainty with which it eventually kills, is truly appalling.
A Burman Cocaine Eater
Extreme poverty is frequently a cause of the habit. The abject wretch who becomes possessed of a few coppers, realizing that the amount will be insufficient for a square meal, buys an innocent looking packet of cocaine, and mixing it with a small quantity of the lime-paste used by betel-chewers in their quids, smears the mixture on his gums, and slowly swallows the saliva. Gone are the cravings for food; a feeling of pleasant warmth suffuses his wasted body; he feels equal to any exertion. Images are distorted to immense proportions; the stick he holds becomes a club of huge dimensions, and he takes great pride in his ability to wield it so easily; an empty jam-tin lying near assumes the proportions of a five-gallon milk-can; and he takes great pleasure in showing his agility in jumping high over the threshold of the door! In all, he considers himself to be a very fine, powerful, prepossessing fellow indeed—until the effects wear off, and he once more sets off to beg or steal the price of another dose of this elevating narcotic.
I once knew a European who was addicted to this drug—he injected it—and a more pitiable object it would be difficult to conceive. He was a dentist by profession, and the last I heard of him was that he had died by his own hand, a frequent termination of this habit, which produces in its last stages, a sort of morbid, gloomy, mania or insanity in its victims. This individual was the victim of all kinds of hallucinations, and under the influence of the drug, was a fluent, and often convincing, liar. He invested himself with numerous medical degrees; he went in terror of imaginary assailants; and he had a fixed idea that his meagre belongings were the envy of murderous burglars. So much so, that on more than one occasion he fired off the revolver he carried by day, and placed under his pillow by night, at imaginary intruders, to the no small risk of other occupants of the house he lived in. The tales of personal adventure he related, the accounts he gave of deadly combats with men twice his puny size, his stories of his property and wealth at home, were the wonder of all to whom he told them, and who were unable to discover in him the characteristic effects of the fell drug cocaine.
We are unfortunately without complete information about cocaine, but we know enough about it to realize that the habit is spreading with the rapidity and devastating effects of a conflagration over the world. As far as India and Burma are concerned, the law is stringent and severe, and the Dangerous Drugs Bill, which was lately occupying the attention of the Home Government, goes far on the road to bringing things at home into line with India and Burma.
The Germans discovered a method by which cocaine can be manufactured synthetically; and bogey hunters will discover a deep plot to undermine the physique and morals of Indians when they are told that the synthetic manufacture of cocaine is, to all intents and purposes, a state-aided industry. It is classed as an industry, and as such receives the spirit used in the preparation of the synthetic drug, duty-free. Ninety per cent. of the cocaine imported into this country before the war came from Germany.
It would probably surprise the Darmstadt firm, which purveyed almost all the cocaine that came to Burma, if they knew that their drachm-phials, neatly capsuled, and labelled “Cocaine Hydrochloride,” ought really sometimes to have been labelled “Antefebrin,” for that indeed is what a great number that were seized by the authorities contained. In appearance, cocaine and antefebrin are hard to distinguish from one another; and for a long time the results of analyses led the authorities to suppose that the manufacturers were defrauding their eastern constituents; but the discovery of a complete plant consisting of phials, labels, capsules, and a large quantity of antefebrin, eventually cleared the name of the doubtless reputable manufacturers, and fastened the guilt upon local swindling smugglers.
CHAPTER XII.
Hemp Drugs.
Like the poppy which is cultivated for opium, the hemp plant, cannabis sativa, is grown for ganja, bhang, and churrus, all highly intoxicating drugs; and for its bast fibre which makes such excellent rope.
The history of the plant is interesting, but no more than a very brief allusion to it is necessary here. The first mention of hemp occurs in Chinese literature, about the twenty-eighth century, B.C., when the hemp-seed is mentioned as one of the five or nine kinds of grain. It is mentioned merely as a “sacred grass” in the Athavaveda about 1400 B.C. But the narcotic properties of the plant, with which we are chiefly concerned, do not seem to have been known until the beginning of the fourteenth century A.D. In a Hindu play written about the sixteenth century A.D., Siva brings down the bhang plant from the Himalaya, and gives it to the worshippers of himself. Of more recent evidence, we have the statement of the Emperor Baber, who tells in his Memoirs (1519 A.D.) of the number of times he had taken Maajun. John Lindsay, in his Journal of Captivity in Mysore (1781), relates how his soldiers were made to eat Majum; and lastly, De Quincey, in his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, speaks of Madjoon, which he inaccurately states is a Turkish name for opium.
The hemp plant belongs to the diœcious order of plants, of which the Hop is another member. That is to say, the flowers, male and female, are borne on separate shrubs. The male hemp plants die early, or are removed by hand, an operation which requires expert knowledge of the two plants; but the female is tended and looked after until the flowering tops are developed. These are then collected and dried, and are called ganja. The leaves, stalks and trash are collected, and this is called bhang; while the resin (which is collected by hand, like opium, or sometimes, made to adhere to the clothes, or special leather garments, or even the skins of men who walk up and down among the growing plants and is then scraped off and worked up into a mass by rolling and pressing) is called churrus. This is really the active principle of the hemp. Its presence in the flowering tops, leaves and stalks giving ganja and bhang their narcotic properties; and churrus is therefore more potent in its intoxicating effects than either ganja or bhang.
Ganja is a greenish-brown conglomeration of what looks like half-dried, tightly pressed grass; bhang is somewhat similar in appearance, but looser in form; and churrus, the resin itself, is a greenish-brown, moist mass. When it has been kept some time, it becomes hard, friable, and of a brownish-grey colour. When it assumes this condition and colour, it is inert. All have a characteristic, faintly pungent, odour, and but slight taste. It is interesting to note that the word churrus means a “bag” or “skin.” It is believed that the name was applied to the drug from the skins or bags in which it used to be imported in olden times, from Central Asia.
Indulgence in hemp in India is as common as betel-chewing and tobacco smoking. It is, in one or other of its forms, either smoked, or eaten. (The sweetmeat Majum, is compounded from bhang, honey, sugar, and spices. Sometimes it is infused in cold water to which butter is added. The butter in time takes up the active principle of the drug, and is eaten.) And it is computed that the votaries of hemp, in one or other of its many forms, number three millions! There is great diversity of opinion as to whether hemp is gravely harmful to its consumers, or whether it is merely an undesirable form of indulgence without any evil permanent effects. The Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, which examined the whole question in detail, was of opinion that it was harmless if indulged in moderately, but that the gravest results must follow upon intemperance in its use. As regards its being a fruitful cause of insanity, the evidence of alienists was taken, and the statistics of all the large asylums for the insane in India were examined; but “only 7·3 per cent. of lunatics admitted to asylums were those in which hemp could reasonably be regarded as having been a factor of importance. Moreover, the form of insanity produced yields readily to treatment,” and as hemp has not got the same hold that opium has upon individuals, its discontinuance is easily effected and immediate restoration of the mental faculties comes about.
The moderate use of ganja increases the appetite, and produces a condition of cheerfulness. In excess, hallucinations, and a sort of delirium is excited, and it is in this aggravated state that a man may “run amok.” This is the outstanding evil of the drug: to temporarily madden a man. But, for the fatal consequences which often ensue from running amok, people are apt to put the whole blame on the drug. May it not, however, be that a man whose desire it is to become reckless purposely resorts to the drug to hearten himself? I think it is very likely. It is often discovered, after a man has run amok, that he has for some time been broody or sulky, and suffering under some real or imagined wrong. That he should get desperate, and take in excess what he well knows to be is an excitant infinitely more powerful than alcohol, in order to carry through what he has been longing for some time to do, is not altogether unreasonable.
To digress from the subject immediately under discussion; it is common in discussing crime and its connection with drink, to hear the view expressed that drink is the cause of crime primâ facie; whereas it often happens that a person intent on revenge cannot bring himself to do his neighbour a mischief in cold blood and requires a little “Dutch courage” to tune himself up to the pitch of not caring for consequences. Too often the crime committed is the result of impetuosity; impetuosity exacerbated by drink. We never hear of offences against property being attributed to drunkenness; and yet, from the moral standpoint, the deliberate commission of theft or robbery is evidential of greater obliquity than the passionate striking of one’s enemy with whatever comes to hand at the moment.
Medical Jurisprudence is crowded with instances in which hemp has been employed in the commission of crimes. A single instance, which came within the writer’s personal experience, will however suffice. The Civil Surgeon of ... had gone out on tour leaving behind his wife and family of three small boys. The bedroom occupied by Mrs. Blank adjoined that usually occupied by the doctor, which contained a large, heavy iron safe in which was Mrs. Blank’s jewellery and a large sum of money. That night, Mrs. Blank and the children retired to bed at the usual hour; but upon waking in the morning, she felt unrefreshed and languid. The children complained of a like feeling. Going into her husband’s room, Mrs. Blank was shocked to find that the safe had disappeared, one of its heavy massive handles lay wrenched off upon the floor, and a twisted gun barrel near by had too apparently been used ineffectually as a lever. An alarm was raised, and the police called in. Mrs. Blank averred that the safe was too large and heavy for fewer than six powerful men to carry down stairs. That she had been drugged there could be no doubt; she had slept and the children had slept through the night undisturbed, and it was impossible to conceive how they could otherwise have done so, with evidences of such noisy activities abundant in the next room. The safe was never found, and the culprits were never brought to book; but the discovery of a small patch of cultivated hemp, on some land belonging to a man servant who was in the Civil Surgeon’s employ at the time of the burglary, made the case clear, and the servant’s complicity morally, if not judicially, certain.
L’ENVOI.
A Persian Allegory.
Three men, one under the effects of alcohol, one under the effects of opium, and the last under the effects of hemp, arrived one night at the closed gates of a city. “Let us break down the gates,” said the alcohol drinker in a fury of rage, “I can do it with my sword!” “Nay,” said the opium eater, “We can rest here outside in comfort till the morning, when the gates will be opened, and we may enter.” “Why all this foolish talk?” whined the one under the effects of hemp. “Let us creep in through the key-hole. We can make ourselves small enough!”
APPENDIX.
An Historical Note on Opium in India and Burma.
It is doubtful whether there is a more valuable drug in the Materia Medica than opium. Fundamentally, it is the dried juice of the Papaver Somniferum or white poppy, and although all varieties of poppy are capable of producing opium, the best comes from the white, and it is this variety that is systematically cultivated for the world’s supply of opium.
Opium has been the cause of at least one war, namely, the war between England and China, and a perusal of the accounts of piracy in the eastern seas during the sixteenth century affords numerous instances of pitched battles between traders and pirates whose one object seems to have been to get possession of valuable cargoes of opium.
The cultivation of the poppy, as a garden flower at any rate, was certainly practised as far back as eight hundred years before Christ. Homer, who lived between 800 B.C. and 700 B.C.[6] mentions it in his Iliad.[7] Cornelius Nepos also mentions the poppy in Italy; when Tarquin indicated to the envoy sent to him by his son Sextus Tarquinius, what he wanted done to the chief inhabitants of Etruria, by striking down all the tallest poppies in his garden.[8]
Hippocrates, who lived in the fifth century before Christ, and who is famous as the founder of Greek medical literature, is the first to mention poppy juice, and the virtues of the poppy were undoubtedly known to him; but the physical effects of opium were not definitely mentioned until the first century before Christ, when Vergil, who lived from 70 B.C. to 19 B.C., writes of the “Poppy pervaded with Lethean sleep,”[9] and the “Sleep-giving poppy.”[10] It may be mentioned in passing, that in Greek mythology Lethe is a river that flows through the regions of the dead, the waters of which, if drunk by anyone, cause oblivion in regard to their past existence.
In the first century after Christ, opium was known as a medicine. Opium is mentioned by this name by Pliny[11] and by Dioscorides[12] both of whom lived in this century and its soporific effect was well known. The poppy was cultivated for opium on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, and as the bulk of the trade between Europe and the Indies passed through these countries, it is certain that this drug, whose value was known, must have formed a part of the trade, though not, perhaps, to such a great extent as to attract attention.
Early in the seventh century after Christ, the religion of Islam was established in Arabia. By the commandments of this new religion the use of alcohol was absolutely forbidden, and it is supposed that those who had been used to alcohol began to use opium and hemp drugs as substitutes, the fact that these two drugs were not explicitly mentioned being sufficient sanction, apparently, for their use. It seems certain that with the spread of Islamism, the use of opium as a stimulant became more widely diffused. The Arabs were at that time, to all intents and purposes, masters of the eastern seas. They made long voyages, and carried on a trade with India and China, and from contemporary literature it has been definitely established that it was the Arabs that introduced the poppy, and a knowledge of its properties, into China. It is probable that opium was used as a stimulant in India also, at this time, but nothing is definitely known about this, and the history of the production and use of the drug before the sixteenth century is obscure. There are many indications, however, that the opium habit came into India in the eighth century, when the Arabs invaded and conquered Sind; and as the habit spread with the wanderings of the Arabs, there is much in the surmise. From this time, up to the end of the eleventh century, the Mahomedan invaders brought the greater part of India under their rule or influence, and in Portuguese Chronicles, written in the sixteenth century, the cultivation of the poppy, the opium habit, the production of opium, and its export are talked of as established things. Authorities on India conclude, from the inherent reluctance of the Indian to rapidly adopt new habits or crops, that the opium habit, and the cultivation of the poppy for opium, must have taken at least three hundred years or so to develop over such large areas.
The Portuguese discovered the Cape route to India in 1488, but it was not till ten years later that they first crossed the Indian Ocean and appeared on the west coast of India. They visited all important places on the coasts, and the great Islands of the Malay Archipelago, and established themselves in many places. They were not welcome, however, and were treated as intruders by Oriental traders. Many and fierce were the encounters between the Moors, and Arabs, and the intruders, who were, in the greater number, buccaneers and pirates rather than merchants. Numerous references to opium occur in the literature of those times. Vespucci mentions “opium, aloes, and many other drugs too numerous to detail” in a list of the cargo carried by Cabral’s fleet from India to Lisbon in 1501. In 1511 Giovanni da Empoli mentions the capture of eight Gujarat ships laden with opium and other merchandize; and in a letter written in 1513 by Albuquerque to the King of Portugal, he says “I also send you a man of Aden who knows how to work afyam (opium) and the manner of collecting it. If Your Highness would believe me, I would order poppies of the Açores to be sown in all the fields of Portugal and command afyam to be made, which is the best merchandize that obtains in these places, and by which much money is made; owing to the thrashing which we gave Aden no afyam has come to India, and where it once was worth 12 pardoes a faracolla, there is none to be had at 80. Afyam is nothing else, Senhor, but the milk of the poppy; from Cayro (sic) whence it used to come, none comes now from Aden; therefore, Senhor, I would have you order them to be sown and cultivated, because a shipload would be used yearly in India, and the labourers would gain much also, and the people of India are lost without it, if they do not eat it; and set this fact in order, for I do not write to Your Highness an insignificant thing.”
Duarte Barbosa[13] (1516) makes several references to opium:—
Duy (Diu): “They load at this port of the return voyage cotton ... and opium, both that which comes from Aden, and that which is made in the kingdom of Cambay, which is not so fine as that of Aden.”
Peigu (Burma): “Many Moorish ships assemble at these ports of Peigu, and bring thither much cloth of Cambay and Palecate, coloured cottons and silks, which the Indians call patola, which are worth a great deal here; they also bring opium, copper ... and a few drugs from Cambay.”
Ava: “The merchants bring here for sale quicksilver, vermilion, coral, copper ... opium, scarlet cloth and many other things from the kingdom of Cambay.” D’Orta described Cambay opium as yellowish, while the Aden variety was black and hard, and apparently the better liked kind.[14]
A Dutchman named Linschoten,[15] in an account of his travels and voyages, in 1596, gives an exaggerated account of the effects of opium. He says: “Amfion, so called by the Portingales, is by the Arabians, Mores (Moors) and Indians called affion, in Latin, opio or opium. It cometh out of Cairo in Egypt, and out of Aden upon the coast of Arabia, which is the point of the land entering into the Red Sea, sometimes belonging to the Portingales, but most part out of Cambaia, and from Deccan; that of Cairo is whitish and is called Mecerii; that of Aden and the places bordering upon the mouth of the Red Sea is blackish and hard; that which come from Cambaia and Deccan is softer and reddish. Amfion is made of sleepeballs, or poppie, and is the gumme which cometh forth of the same, to ye which end it is cut up and opened. The Indians use much to eat Amfion, specially the Malabares, and thither it is brought by those of Cambaia and other places in great abundance. He that useth to eate it must eate it daylie, otherwise he dieth and consumeth himself. When they begin to eate it, and are used unto it, they eate at the least twenty or thirty grains in weight everie day, sometimes more; but if for four or five days he chanceth to leave it, he dieth without fail. Likewise he that hath never eaten it, and will venture at the first to eate as much as those that daylie use it, it will surely kill him, for I certainly believe it is a kind of poyson. Such as use it goe alwaise as if they were half asleepe. They eate much of it because they would not feel any great labour or unquietness when they are at work, but they use it most for lecherie ... although such as eate much thereof, are in time altogether unable to company with a woman and whollie dried up, for it drieth and whollie cooleth man’s nature that use it, as the Indians themselves do witness. Wherefore it is not much used by the nobilitie, but only for the cause aforesaid.”
Cæsar Fredericke,[16] a Venetian merchant, who travelled extensively in the East, writes, about 1581, an account of his voyages and some of his ventures: “And for because that at my departure from Pegu opium was in great request, I went then to Cambay, to employ a good round summe of money in opium, and there I bought sixty parcels of opium which cost me 2,000 and 100 duckets, every ducket at 4 shillings 2 pence....” It is interesting to note that one Ralph Fitch,[17] who travelled in the East from 1583 to 1591, visited Burma, or Pegu as it was called by voyagers then, writes that opium from Cambay and Mecca was in great demand. These references, and a great many more could be given, go to show that by the sixteenth Century opium was not only well known, but formed an important item of maritime trade in the East.
By 1612, the English and Dutch East India Companies had been formed. The Dutch had established a trading post or factory at Surat, from which they were afterwards expelled by the English Company, and both Companies had factories on the Hughli in Bengal. They were not friends, and often fought, but they combined against the Portuguese and Spaniards who had appeared on the scene a hundred years before, and who looked upon all trade from India round the Cape as their monopoly. By the beginning of the seventeenth century the Portuguese had lost almost all their possessions in India to the Dutch, and their trade had weakened and diminished to a point which rendered them almost negligible as competitors in trade. At this time, several European nations granted monopolies of trade to the Indies, and the French and the Danes now came on the scene. It was found impossible, however, to keep out private individuals who sought to set up trading factories on their own account, despite monopolies, and swarms of these adventurers came in to trade in all the valuable articles of merchandize, including opium. They looked upon force as their only law, and their depredations on the seas perpetrated against the Indian sailors brought about the speedy decay of the old native sea-trade.
Although the English Company established a predominance over the Dutch in general trade, the latter maintained a lead in the trade in opium. They exported it to Ceylon, Malacca and the Straits, and it has been ascertained from contemporary chronicles that the Dutch had attempted to arrange with Indian Princes to monopolize the export trade of opium to China. In this, however, they failed, for the Portuguese, who had always had a monopoly of the export of Malwa opium, still held possession of their ports on the Cambay Gulf, and so were in a favourable situation for this trade.
In those days, as in these, Europeans did not come out to the East for the sake of their health. They came out with only one object, and that was to make money. Times have not changed since then. It was not unnatural therefore that they should look about for as speedy a means of amassing a fortune as possible, and found opium. Opium was to be got cheap in exchange for the merchandize with which trading ships came laden to the East. It was portable and durable, and as it was in great demand in the countries east of India it constituted an excellent substitute for money with which were purchased silks, tea, spices and pepper for which there was a great demand in Europe. It is probable that this demand for opium stimulated production and increased the output of opium in India, specially since the entry of the Europeans into the field of commerce in Eastern waters killed the native sea-trade which used to bring opium from Turkey. This increase in the output of opium must not be held to indicate an increase in consumption, as has been made out by some. On the contrary, it may be inferred that a decrease was brought about by the introduction of tobacco in the seventeenth century. When tobacco was unknown and the use of alcohol prohibited to Mahomedans, and looked upon as disgraceful by Hindoos, it is likely that the opium habit was more widely prevalent.
There was little change in the condition of affairs during the greater part of the eighteenth century, but a gradual increase in the demand from China about the middle of this century came about from the substitution of opium smoking for the smoking of tobacco.
The next stage in the history of the subject begins with the occupation of Bengal by the British East Indies Company in 1758, but it is first necessary to briefly outline how matters stood prior to it in connection with the production and sale of opium under Moghul administration.
No restrictions were imposed upon the cultivation of the poppy, and the agriculturist was as free to cultivate it as any other crop. He could sell his opium to whom he pleased, though generally he sold it to the money-lender who advanced him the money with which to begin cultivation ... a practice which obtains to this day in places to which the co-operative movement has not as yet spread. The opium produced was made over to the money-lender at a fixed price, but the rate at which the money-lender disposed of this opium was regulated only by the demand by European traders, and high prices were obtained. It is very natural that the native rulers of the day should have wished to participate to some extent in the huge profits made by these private traders, and a system was introduced by which a certain part of the profits on opium was paid into the State treasuries. This was willingly paid, as the burden was borne by the cultivator. As soon as the system came into force, the money-lenders formed a ring, and regulated the price paid by them for opium to cultivators, and took care to fix it at such a rate that the State demand did not deplete their own purses too much. As time went on, the confusion of the Moghul Empire, which began and ended, in the quarrels of Suraj-ud-Dowlah, did away to some extent with these rings, but custom and tradition are so strong in India, particularly when supported by men of substance, that when we occupied Bihar, a ring of wealthy opium dealers were found to be exercising an unauthorised monopoly in Patna opium which we were in too insecure a position to break.
This is how matters stood. But for some time before, the general confusion of the Moghul Empire, and its weakened authority, brought about a state of turmoil and disorder which obliged European merchants to raise troops, and convert their factories into garrisoned fortresses. Clive’s victory over Suraj-ud-Dowlah at Plassey in 1757, however, brought things to a head, and established the British Company as military masters in Bengal. Suraj-ud-Dowlah was dethroned, and Mir Jaffer was set up in his place, the administration being confided to him under the general control of the Company. But this form of dual government resulted only in the oppression of the people, and general maladministration. The servants of the Company had always been allowed the privilege of private trade, and in this state of affairs they had unique opportunities for trading with the greatest advantage to themselves. Opium was, of course, exploited to the full, and when, what was known as the Patna Council, a number of the Company’s servants, whose business it was to look after the Company’s interests in Patna, discovered the existence of the opium ring, they were not long in appropriating its functions, and the very solid financial advantages it possessed. It is, perhaps, as well to explain that all this was done for the benefit of the several members of the Patna Council, and not on behalf of their employer. But the Council found that to avoid trouble it was necessary to admit the Dutch and French Company’s servants who were naturally anxious to share in this unauthorized trade, and they very wisely admitted them, but to a minor share only.
In 1773, Warren Hastings was made the first Governor-General, and one of the first reforms he undertook was the suppression of private trade among the Company’s servants, and of all irregular and unauthorised monopolies. When the Patna opium monopoly came to be examined, it was found to involve important considerations, and, after a full discussion in Council, it was decided not to set it free, but to make it a source of revenue to the State. It is to be expected that there were many against this, and various arguments were offered against the measure, but these were met satisfactorily; the Moghul monopolies had existed for years, and there was nothing novel in the creation of one properly regulated. Besides, the cultivators would be better treated, and would be less at the mercy of private traders and interlopers. The argument that if left free, more opium would be produced, was answered by Warren Hastings holding that increase was undesirable in the case of a pernicious luxury. Strangely enough, a strong line of opposition was taken by Francis, who was against all monopolies on general principles, and by the Board of Directors of the British East India Company, on the score of its being a form of oppression. They suggested leaving the trade free, subject to a Customs duty. His non-compliance with these instructions was one of the articles of Warren Hastings’ impeachment later: “That this monopoly was a despotic interference with the liberty of the ryot, and that he should have complied with the Directors’ suggestion.”
The working of this new monopoly did not differ in essentials from the old form. The opium was collected from the cultivators by a contractor, but instead of its being handed over to the Patna Council, it was taken to Calcutta, where the bulk of it was sold by auction to the highest bidder. The balance was divided between the Dutch, French, and the commercial side of the British East Indies Companies at average auction prices.
The revised conditions under which this new State monopoly worked ensured the best opium coming into the Company’s hands. It also did away with “middle-men,” and all the profits which would have gone to cultivators if they had been allowed free trade. It is not unnatural, therefore, that some one should conceive the idea of securing the profits made by the sea-traders as well. In 1775, the revenue officers of Patna estimated that if the Dutch and French were kept out of the trade, 33,000 chests of Bengal and Bihar opium would be available for export, and suggested that the Company should export this to China, where it could be sold at an immense profit. The letter was considered in Council, but the suggestion was dropped by common consent without discussion. Warren Hastings, however, suggested an alternative of direct official agency, to the exclusion of the contractor, but this motion was lost by a majority, and the matter was closed. But in 1781 a state of affairs arose in which the Company found itself sadly short of money. We were at war with the French, Dutch, and Spaniards, at sea, and with Hyder Ali and the Maharattas on land. In consequence our ports were closed to foreign trade, the seas were not safe for ships flying the British flag, and all available merchant ships were employed in carrying grain and other supplies to Madras. Opium was unsaleable at Calcutta. It was under such conditions that it was decided to export opium to China, and, accordingly, the ‘Nonsuch’ with 2,000 chests, was sent to the supercargoes at Canton, and the ‘Betsey’ with 1,450 chests to the Straits of Malacca. A loan of 10 lakhs of rupees was raised on the cargo of the ‘Betsey,’ to be repaid by bills of exchange on the Company from the Canton supercargoes. Another loan of 10 lakhs was raised from the public on the cargo of the ‘Nonsuch’ on similar terms. The ‘Betsey,’ after disposing of part of her cargo to advantage, was captured by the French and Dutch. The cargo of the ‘Nonsuch’ was disposed of at a loss after much difficulty on account of the prohibition of the import of opium by the Chinese, and on account of the “immense quantities” of opium brought to Macao by Portuguese ships before the arrival of the ‘Nonsuch.’ The loss on this venture was 69,973 dollars.
The Board of Directors, on hearing of this venture, which was undoubtedly an exception to the course of policy pursued by the East India Company in regard to the trade, while holding that there was no objection to the sale of opium in the Straits of Malacca, condemned the action of its representatives in exporting opium to China, where the import of opium was prohibited, as being beneath the dignity of the Company.
No more opium was exported to China, and the working of the monopoly remained unchanged until it was reformed, and the system of direct official agency was introduced by Lord Cornwallis. This system has remained in force up to the present.
Malwa Opium.—The first factory established by the British East Indies Company on the West Coast of India was at Surat in 1613. The Portuguese and Dutch had already established themselves here, and all of them participated in the opium trade to some extent. The Dutch were eventually expelled by the British who, as the Moghul power diminished, and the Maharattas became the rulers, assumed a commanding political position. But owing to their having a minor share in the territories along the coast, the major portion belonging to native princes and the Portuguese, although they could participate in the trade in Malwa opium, they were unable to assume a monopoly.
By the end of the eighteenth century, the State monopoly in Bengal had been firmly established, and good prices were being got for export opium. It was with a certain amount of apprehension therefore that they looked upon the trade in Malwa opium from the West Coast, and in 1803, this apprehension developing into something stronger, an order was issued prohibiting the export of Malwa opium from the Bombay ports. In 1805, the Bombay Government was asked to prohibit the cultivation of the poppy within the territories, some of which were newly acquired; but this order was demurred to, and the Directors concurred, holding that the cultivation was for opium for local consumption only, and not for export, and therefore unobjectionable.
At this time smuggling was rife. There were many routes, some very circuitous, by which the opium could be got to the sea-coast without trespassing upon the territories of the Company, but after 1818, when the third Maharatta war resulted in our getting possession of the whole of the Bombay sea-coast except Sind, how to get to the sea was a problem which confronted smugglers with increased complexity. But even so, the authorities were always faced with the danger of smuggled opium competing with Bengal opium and lowering its price. Treaties were therefore entered into with some of the States which had most reason to be grateful to us, by which they undertook to prohibit the export of the opium produced in their possessions, to check the cultivation of the poppy, and to sell what opium was produced to the agents of the Company at a certain fixed price. The arrangement did not differ materially from the system adopted in Bengal. But there were other States, such as Scindia and Jeypore, which refused to enter into alliances on these terms, and a time came when those who had signed treaties began to look upon the conditions they had agreed to as repressive. Merchants, who had been dispossessed of their profits by this system, were greatly in its disfavour, and there was no doubt about the disapproval of these measures by cultivators who were deprived of all the advantages of a competitive trade. In 1829 it was therefore decided to abandon this system in lieu of another, which required that a certain transit duty be paid on all opium passing through British territory to Bombay for export to China. This transit or pass duty was fixed at Rs. 175 a chest, but it varied, rising as it did in 1892 to Rs. 600 a chest. This system still exists in regard to Malwa opium.
All the details of legislation and regulation which concern this subject certainly come within the scope of this note, but their sketchy treatment is made necessary by considerations of space. A relation of the Chinese aspect would fill a volume, and no attempt is made here to describe it. But I feel that this note would not be complete without some reference to Burma.
That the use of opium was known in Burma long before British rule was introduced is evident from the records of Fitch and of Cæsar Fredricke, who visited Burma in the latter half of the sixteenth century. From the records of the Dutch East India Company also, Burma, it is seen, was looked upon as a good market for opium. It is very probable, therefore, that the luxury use of opium was practised by the Burmese people. The Buddhist religion prohibits the use of all intoxicants, and the edicts, issued by the State from time to time against their use, and later on, against opium in particular, appear to have been inspired by the Buddhist hierarchy. But it does not appear that the import of opium into Burma was prohibited by any measure of State prior to its annexation by the British. In the enquiry of 1891, Mr. Norton, Commissioner of Irrawaddy, wrote that, before the annexation of Pegu in 1852, although capital punishment was prescribed for Burmans found with opium, yet opium was plentiful and easy to get at a cheaper rate than when he was writing. Several respectable Burmese gentlemen who were consulted during 1878 admitted that opium was freely used always.
Arakan and Tenasserim were annexed in 1826 after the first Burmese war and were attached to the Bengal Presidency for the purposes of administration under the Deputy Governor of Bengal, and it was not until 1862 that they, along with Pegu, were formed into the province of British Burma under the Chief Commissioner, Sir Arthur Phayre.
In 1826, the retail sale of opium in Bengal was conducted under the farming system. By this system certain tracts were farmed out to selected persons either by tender or by auction. These farmers were obliged to purchase Excise opium from the Government opium factories at a fixed price, which included the cost price and duty. This system was extended to Arakan and Tenasserim. As time went on, this system of opium farms was found to be bad and was replaced by the issue of free licenses to respectable persons. As Arakan was in a favourable position for smuggling, this system of free licenses was introduced there also, but Tenasserim, which did not afford the same facilities for smuggling, was allowed to retain the old system. That the system was unsatisfactory, chiefly on account of its tendency to cheapen opium, is apparent from a statement made by an old inhabitant of Akyab to Colonel Strover during the inquiry of 1891 that he had seen Government opium hawked about for sale in the streets during the early days of British rule. In 1864 Sir Arthur Phayre strongly condemned this new system, and in 1865 he drew up a set of rules which were brought into effect in 1866. The spirit of these rules is observed up to the present day in regard to the limit placed upon the quantity of opium which may be purchased by a licensee during a year for sale at his shop.
How things stood in Upper Burma at this time can be inferred from a report made to the Government of India by Sir Charles Crosthwaite under date 20th March, 1888. “On our taking over the country, stringent rules were enacted and somewhat rigorously enforced against the sale of opium. Many Chinese were flogged and otherwise punished for engaging in a traffic which, although it may have been nominally prohibited, was allowed to go on under the Burmese Government.” From the statement of an official of the Burmese Government it would appear that the Burmese Government never openly recognized the opium traffic in Upper Burma; those persons only were punished who sold opium to Burmans. The Burmese Government admitted the existence of the traffic by levying customs dues on all opium imported into Upper Burma. In 1872, the British Political Agent reported that large quantities of Shan and Yünnan opium were being imported into Upper Burma and also smuggled. A Mr. Adams, of the American Baptist Mission, who was at Mandalay from 1874 to 1879, states that the pôngyis took great pains to suppress the consumption of opium by Burmans, with the hearty support of King Mindon, who was a great zealot in religion, much under the influence of the priesthood, and active in supporting every endeavour to enforce the law of prohibition. But this law was personal to the Burmans, and not a territorial law. Other races were under no restrictions in the matter of opium or liquor, and when our troops took Mandalay in 1885, enormous stores of opium were found secreted in the houses of Chinese merchants who said that they sold it regularly to Burmans. It is true that under King Thebaw’s rule most of King Mindon’s edicts became dead letters, and even pôngyis became addicted to opium.
The opium question attracted much interest, both locally and in England. The Anti-Opium Society took it up and much correspondence took place, which resulted in the total prohibition of opium to Burmans in Upper Burma and the rigid restriction of issues to them in Lower Burma. The reason for this is concisely put by Sir A. Mackenzie, Chief Commissioner of Burma, in a Minute: “I do not believe that opium in India or China does any great harm to the majority of those who use it, i.e., to moderate smokers and eaters. But here, in Burma, we are brought face to face with the fact that the religion of the people specifically denounces the use of the drug; that their native kings treated its use as a heinous offence; that these ideas are so deeply rooted in the minds of the people that every consumer feels himself to be, and is, regarded by his neighbours as a sinner and a criminal; that the people are by temperament pleasure-loving and idle and easily led away by vicious indulgences; that they have little self-restraint and are always prone to rush into extremes. When a Burman takes to drink or opium he wants to get drunk or drugged as fast as he can, or as often as he can. All this seems to me to point to the necessity of special treatment.”