Lt.-Col. C. D. Bruce read a paper on the above subject before the members of the Union Church Literary and Social Guild last night. A large and appredative audience listened to the description of the lecturer's travels.
After being introduced by the Rev. ©. E. Darwent, Lt.-Col. Bruce said that the' principal object of his journey was the' making of a detailed survey, and three months were occupied in' travelling from the Chinese frontier at Chiayakaan to Peking, during which he and his companion, Captain Layard, hardly ever spent more than one night at the same place. The lecturer then procesded to describe his entry into China by the frontier fortress of the Gi Wall. Chiayukunn at the present day consists of somewhat inferior mud-brick fort, 150 yards square, with no guns and a garrison of about. ten withered old men. Piles of small round stones are heaped up at intervals round the walis for the purpose of repelling invaders. The next place to be reached was Suchou, where the travellers witnessed the celebrated Feast of Lanterns. The festivities were responsible for a delay of three days, and then commenced the seven-ten-day journey to Liangchou, a distance of 300 miles, over a miserable track in native carts. It was during thie part of the journey that the party met the first European they had seen for six months—Mr. Déring of the Bible Society. After describing the inhabitants of Western Kansab, the lecturer turned to the evils of opium, and said "One blot, and that no small one, lies on the people of Western Kansu. Tt is that men and women are to a fearful extent habitual and confirmed smokers of opium. From personal observation I should have placed the percentage high, bat had I not had the beat authority for saying ae, nota high it would appear to be.
Monseigneur Otto, Catholic Bishop. of Kansu, who has spent thirty years of his life in China, and a large portion of that time in Kansy, reckons six men out of every eight of the population as confirmed in the habit. Opium-smoking is sometimes compared to the unnecessary drinking common to most European nations. But this in no sense represents a true perspective. It is well known that opium is largely io use among other Asiatic races, some of our own native Indian soldiers being i of this number; but that it can for one moment be considered in China as merely harmful excess confined to a small minority of those who use the drug is not the truth. Without statistics it useless to attempt to draw exact comparisons, but it is only necessary to travel for a few months in Western Kansu to see how all-embracing in its fearful effects the Facilis des census Averni is a maxim with which we are all family and in the sense in which it is generally used it applies to nothing 80 aptly as the career of the immoderate opium-smoker. During the last efforts have been made to control, if not to extinguish the evil; and if high-sounding edicts' from the Imperial brash could alone accomplish the impossible we might hope for better things.
"Worthy of all praise as such attempts are, there would be more hope of ultimate success had moderation been shown in the commencement of the crusade. Unfortanately the edict has gone forth that in ten years opium-smoking will no longer exist. China, and in this form I feel confident the experiment may be said to be doomed. Let us suppose, for the sake of analogy, that a bill could pass through two Houses of Parliament suppressing not only the abuse of beer-drinking, but the use of beer within the same limit of time.
Would any person expect to see ought but failure accompany such a pre-pesterous attempt? Yet the task to which the rulers of China have yoked themselves is thousand times more impossible.
Tt is allowed by the yese anthorrities, who, it may be said incidentally, do not as a rule err in severity in the enumeration of national faults, that forty per cent of the Chinese use opium. Had the percentage been raised considerably, and the forty per cent starred abusing the use of opium, perhaps we should have been nearer the real figures. Whatever these may be, it should be remembered that the abuse of this drug is not confined to the lower orders. On the contrary, it numbers among its slaves—those most hopelessly addicted to its use—the highest and most powerfal in the country.
"Not only as consumers do we find such men, but also as producers. Much of the land upon which opium is growa is in the hands of magistrates and even higher officials. As the most productive crop, in spite of its paying in places double taxation, the ares under the poppy is anonolly increasing in Chins. In some parts good wheatland is turned into poppy-land, with the result that whole districts formerly capable of raising sufficient food-staff for local requirements must now import.
"Nor are the vested interests in favour of the drug less strong in other ways. It is well known that' no Chinese magistrate could exist upon the miserable stipend he -receives. It has hitherto been his business, and that of no one else, how he supplemented his inone of the chief sources was, extra royalties or " pickings which could be dragged in an ever-
The few examples quoted only serve to indicate some of the vested interests which will be found in the inert mass of those lying in the way of an honest attempt to curtail the supply or use of opium.
Whether the Chinese Government, hitherto @ synonym for conservatism of the most harmful kind, is likely to succeed in the crusade it has initiated against opium-smoking, time alone can show.
"If it is willing to supply adequate guarantees that the attempt is a sincere one, made solely for the good of the people, then indeed has China awakened to the evil, and it is England's destiny once more to stand for progress and the right, and to help to the utmost of her ability.
From Liangchou the route lay to Lanchou, the Provincial capital, situated at the narrowest in the centre of a basin-like valley, surrounded by high hills. From the north-west the city is approached by bridge of boats or a ferry, according to the season of the year. The annual construction of the bridge of boats is conducted with considerable ceremony. Lanchou is famed for the beauty of its women and the fragrance of its tobacco. After a week's stay at this city Col, Brace and his companion set out towards Pekii passing through Pingyang, Chingyangfa, with its famous tunnel, Fenchou, Tai-oanfa and Chengtingfo, a station on the Lu-Hun Railway, en route.
A vote of thanks to the lecturer, proposed by Dr. Timothy Richard, brought an enjoyable evening to close.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.