Opium is prepared in different forms, in the various localities for market. Bengal opium is made into balls of about 3½ lbs. weight, and packed in chests, each containing forty balls. They are about the size of a child’s head, coated externally with poppy petals, agglutinated with lewah to the thickness of about half an inch. Garden Patna opium is in square cakes, about three inches in diameter, and one inch thick, wrapped in thin plates of mica. Malwa opium is in round flattened cakes, of about ten ounces in weight, packed in “boosa,” or in coarsely-powdered poppy-petals, or in some instances without any coating at all. Cutch opium is in small cakes, rather more than an inch in diameter, enclosed in fragments of leaves. Kandeish opium is imported in round flattened cakes, of about half a pound weight. Egyptian opium occurs in round flattened cakes, about three inches in diameter, covered with the vestiges of some leaf. This kind is very dry, but it is considered inferior in quality to the Turkish kinds. Persian opium is in the form of sticks, about six inches in length, and half an inch in diameter, enveloped in smooth shining paper, and tied with cotton. Smyrna opium occurs in regular rounded or flattened masses, of various sizes, rarely exceeding two pounds in weight, sometimes covered with the capsules of a species of dock. Constantinople opium is either in large irregular cakes, or small, regular, lenticular-formed cakes, covered with poppy-leaf, and from two to two and a half inches in diameter.
Formerly the balls of Bengal opium were covered with tobacco-leaves; but Mr. Flemming introduced the practice of covering them with poppy-petals, which service the Court of Directors of the East India Company acknowledged by presenting him with 50,000 rupees. Sometimes these balls are so soft as to burst their skins, when much of the liquid opium is lost. The quantity of opium produced annually in Bengal exceeds five millions of pounds, and the income derived by the Hon. East India Company from this source is not less than £5,003,162.
The kinds of opium most approved in the English market is the Smyrna, and in China and the East generally, the preference is given to the produce of India. Before used by the opium-smoker, the extract undergoes a course of preparation, the following being the method pursued in Singapore, as described by Mr. Little.
Between three and four o’clock in the morning the fires are lighted. A chest is then opened by one of the officers of the establishment of the opium farmer, and the number of balls delivered to the workmen proportioned to the demand. The balls are then divided into equal halves by one man, who scoops out with his fingers the inside or soft part, and throws it into an earthen dish, frequently during the operation moistening and washing his hands in another vessel, the water of which is carefully preserved. When all the soft part is carefully abstracted from the hardened skins or husks, these are broken up, split, divided, and torn, and thrown into the earthen vessel, containing the water already spoken of, saving the extreme outsides, which are not mixed with the others, but thrown away, or sometimes sold to adulterate chandu in Johore and the back of the island.
The second operation is to boil the husks with a sufficient quantity of water in a large, shallow, iron pot, for such a length of time as may be requisite to break down thoroughly the husks, and dissolve the opium. This is then strained through folds of China-paper, laid on a frame of basket-work, and over the paper is placed a cloth. The strained fluid is then mixed with the opium scooped out in the first operation, and placed in a large iron pot, when it is boiled down to the consistence of thickish treacle. In this second operation, the refuse from the straining of the boiled husk is again boiled in water, filtered through paper, and the filtered fluid added to the mass, to be made into chandu. The refuse is thrown outside, and little attended to. It is dried and sold to the Chinese going to China for from ten to seventeen shillings the hundredweight, who pound it, and adulterate good opium with it. The paper that has been used in straining contains a small quantity of opium, it is carefully dried and used medicinally by the Chinese.
In the third operation, the dissolved opium being reduced to the consistence of treacle, is seethed over a fire of charcoal, of a strong and steady, but not fierce temperature, during which time it is most carefully worked, then spread out, then worked up again and again by the superintending workman, so as to expel the water, and, at the same time, avoid burning it. When it is brought to the proper consistence, it is divided into half-a-dozen lots, each of which is spread like a plaister on a nearly flat iron pot, to the depth of from half to three-quarters of an inch, and then scored in all manner of directions to allow the heat to be applied equally to every part. One pot after another is then placed over the fire, turned rapidly round, then reversed, so as to expose the opium itself to the full heat of the red fire. This is repeated three times, the length of time requisite, and the proper heat are judged of by the workman, from the effluvium and the colour, and here the greatest dexterity is requisite, for a little more fire, or a little less would destroy the morning’s work, or eighty or a hundred pounds’ worth of opium. The head workmen are men who have learned their trade in China, and from their great experience, receive high wages.
The fourth operation consists in again dissolving this fired opium in a large quantity of water, and boiling it in copper vessels till it is reduced to the consistence of the chandu used in the shops. The degree of tenacity being the index of its complete preparation, which is judged of by drawing it out with slips of bamboo.
By this long process, many of the impurities in the opium are got rid of, and are left in the refuse thrown out, such as vegetable matter, part of the resin and oil, with the extractive matter. By the seething process, the oil and resin are almost entirely dissipated, so that the chandu, as compared with the crude opium, is less irritating and more soporific. The quantity of chandu obtained from the soft opium is about seventy-five per cent., but from the opium, including the husk, not more than 50 to 54 per cent.
The heat to be endured by the men during this operation is very great, and can only be tolerated when custom has inured them to it. One of these men, Mr. Little graphically describes. He was quite a character in his way. “From three in the morning till ten in the forenoon he stands before the boiling cauldron, with a fan in one hand, and a feather in the other; with the latter he scoops off the scum that forms, while, with the fan, he prevents the fluid from boiling over. He never speaks, but is always smiling; nor does he move, except to quench his thirst, from a bucket of water placed beside him. His trowsers are his only article of dress, the floor his bed, a little rice his food. When his labour is finished, his enjoyment is to drink arrack till he is insensible, from which he is wakened in the morning to his work. He has but one idea, and that is, the prospect of getting drunk on his favourite beverage; for his work is mechanically done, and costs him not a thought, no more than it does the dog that turns the spit. But he smiles, as he thinks of the revel for the night; and with his whole soul wrapped up in that fancied bliss, he heeds not the days that go by. He is a singular being, and in another country, would be the inmate of a mad-house.”
The method of preparation in China and Hong-Kong, is identical with that pursued at Singapore. When the chandu or prepared extract of opium is consumed, it leaves a refuse consisting of charcoal, empyreumatic oil, some of the salts of the opium, and part of the chandu not consumed. One ounce of the chandu gives nearly half an ounce of the refuse called Tye or Tinco. This is smoked or swallowed by the poorer classes, who cannot afford the pure extract, and for this they only pay half the price of chandu. When smoked, it yields a further refuse called Samshing, which contains a very small quantity of the narcotic principle. This last is never smoked, as it cannot furnish any smoke, but is swallowed, and that not unfrequently mixed with arrack. Samshing is used by the very poorest and most indigent class—by beggars and outcasts, and those who, from long habit, are unable to exist without some stimulus from the drug, but are unable to supply themselves with any but the cheapest form in which any of the effects of the narcotic can be obtained.