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and trouble besides exposing the Hong Kong Government to the reproach of connecting itself with the actual manufacture of the noxious drug.
But if an Opium Customs Department should be established in the Colony either with the assistance of the Foreign Inspectorate or independently of it, certain means of securing to the Hong Kong Government a fair payment for the monopoly would be provided, the Monopolist would be charged with a rate of duty on each ball of Opium taken out of bond by him for the purpose of his manufacture.
The amount of that duty might be fixed arbitrarily by law, and should of course be much below the amount of duty on the importation of Opium into China, otherwise the Monopolist would have no object in establishing himself in Hong Kong.
Under the new régime the system of monopoly might, if preferred, be abandoned, and the Hong Kong Government, instead of receiving duty (which it does in the shape of a licence fee) on prepared Opium, might receive it.