156
WEI PEH-T'I
and handed Terranova to the Chinese magistrate.36
The facts that emerged during the trial, different from the earlier version that the foreigners had already accepted, left Juan Yulan somewhat "puzzled".37 This later version, as reported by Morse, is as follows:
The jar which is said to be the instrument that caused the death of the woman was safely delivered by the accused (Terranova) into her hand, and that she fell overboard at the distance of thirty feet and upwards from the ship Emily, that she was seen from on board of the Hero of Malown, an English ship laying near the Emily, and fell overboard while in the act of sculling her Boat, that no Jar or any such instrument was thrown at her, or caused her falling into the Water, that from the relative situation of the boat and the ship it was impossible to strike the woman on the side of the head in which the wound was inflicted,
38
The British thought that the Americans should not have yielded. The Americans had "abandoned a man serving under their flag to the sanguinary laws of this Empire without an endeavour to obtain common justice for him".39 Perhaps the eventual surrender of Terranova to the Chinese gave further credence to the Chinese version of the facts as far as Juan Yuan was concerned. Nevertheless, the underlying reason for this surrender remained the fear that unless the seaman was given up, the Chinese authorities might search the ship and discover opium.
By the time Juan Yuan arrived at Canton, the Chinese had already known opium for more than a thousand years, and, for nearly a century, an official policy had been adopted prohibiting its domestic sale and use. The first opium-producing poppy was brought into China by Arab and Turkish traders some time during the seventh or eighth century, to be used as medicine.40 In the 1660s, the smoking of opium, mixed with tobacco, was introduced into the coastal provinces of Fukien and Kwangtung from Taiwan. By the eighteenth century, the Chinese had devised their own method of opium consumption, by having the smoker reclining on a couch, burning the opium extract over a lamp, and inhaling it through a pipe. The use of this definitely addictive substance became so widespread that as early as 1729 domestic sale and consumption of opium was forbidden by an imperial edict. In 1796, the Chia-ch'ing Emperor prohibited the importation and domestic cultivation of the poppy as well. Since then, all opium used in China was brought in through illicit smuggling. Whereas American ships brought