ian opium business
is not England's business, but the world's business. The world is to-day
paying the cost of this highly expensive luxury along with China. Every
sallow morphine victim on the streets of San Francisco, Chicago, and New
York is helping to pay for this government traffic in vice.

But is Great Britain planning to help China?

The government of the British empire is at present in the hands of the
Liberal party, which has within it a strong reform element. From the Tory
party nothing could be expected; it has always worshipped the Things that
Are, and it has always defended the opium traffic. If either party is to
work this change, it must be that one which now holds the reins of power.
And yet, after generations of fighting against the government opium
industry on the part of all the reform organizations in England, after
Parliament has twice been driven to vote a resolution condemning the
traffic, after generations of statesmen, from Palmerston through Gladstone
to John Morley, have held out assurances of a change, after the Chinese
government, tired of waiting on England, has begun the struggle, this is
the final concession on England's part:

The British government has agreed to decrease the exportation of Indian
opium about eight per cent. per year during a trial period of three years,
in order to see whether the cultivation of the poppy and the number of
opium-smokers is lessened. Should such be the case, exportation to China
will be further decreased gradually.

The reader will observe here some very pretty diplomatic juggling. There
is here none of the spirit which animated the United States last year in
proposing voluntarily to give up a considerable part of its indemnity
money. The British government is yielding to a tremendous popular clamour
at home; but nothing more. Could a government offer less by way of
carrying out the conviction of a national parliament to the effect that
"the methods by which our Indian opium revenues are derived are morally
indefensible"? The English people are urging their government, the Chinese
are diplomatically putting on pressure, the United States is organizing an
international opium commission on the ground that the nations which
consume Indian and Chinese opium have, willy-nilly, a finger in the pie.
And by way of response to this pressure the British government agrees to
lessen very slightly its export for a few years, or until the pressure is
removed and t