mmedans the narcotic
qualities of the plant.

In China there can be no doubt that opium has been known from the
_earliest_[3] times; even if the poppy be not indigenous to that country,
as we might be led to suppose from its mention in a Chinese[4] herbal
compiled more than two centuries ago. In the _General History of South
Yuennan_, published in 1736, opium is noted as a common product of
Yung-chang-foo; and it is remarked by Mr. Hobson, Commissioner of Customs
at Hankow,[5] that, "if 134 years ago so much opium was produced as to
deserve notice in such a work, the production could have been no novelty
to the Chinese population at the beginning of the present century, when we
began to import it in small quantities." Moreover, it is well known that
the seeds of the poppy have been used from time immemorial in the
preparation of cakes and confections. Two Court officials were even
appointed specially to superintend the making of these for the Emperors'
use.[6] Dr. Edkins, in a recent pamphlet on the subject of opium-smoking
in China, quotes an edict against the habit published as early as A.D.
1728, and consequently some forty years before the British took any part
in the trade. Dr. Wells Williams is of opinion that opium may have been
introduced into China from Assam, where it has been used time out of mind.
However that may be, the Chinese may be credited with having improved upon
their use of it by smoking instead of swallowing it; though this, too, is
attributed to the Assamese by Don Sinibaldo de Mas, Spanish Consul in
China.[7]

It may, then, be taken for granted that opium-smoking was known to the
Chinese long before European nations took to importing opium into China.
But at the same time no one will deny that the habit has become enormously
more prevalent than it used to be.

The foreign trade in opium is of comparatively recent growth. The
Portuguese were the first European nation to import it into China. For
some years previous to 1767 they imported from Goa some 200 chests of
Turkey opium to Macao. This they would scarcely have done had there been
no demand for the drug. It was not till 1773 that the East India Company
appeared upon the scene as exporters of opium in very small quantities.
In that year the Company assumed the monopoly of the opium culture in
India, and, according to the existing Mongol practice, farmed it out for
an annual payment in advance. In 1781 a cargo of 1,600 chests was found
unsa