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"hidden". (In one instance it was found in an open drawer in the bureau of the Captain: a drawer used hourly, and in which there was certainly no opium an hour previously!)
Then a procès-verbal is addressed to the captain, he and the consignees go to the Director of Customs and make the best bargain or "transaction" they can, the affair is comfortably settled for every one but the owner, and the ship is allowed to proceed to sea.
Steamers are watched while in Hongkong (for it is there that the opium is put on board for by far the greater part), and searched on the voyage down, in fact every care and precaution possible is taken by the steamers' people to discover "contraband" but, nevertheless, the above enormous sum has been mulcted from foreign vessels.
But I am quite certain that no relief will be obtained here: to put it bluntly: the Governor General is very much in want of money: is he likely to do anything that will deprive him of these occasional very welcome windfalls, varying from $3,000 to $15,000? Is he likely to consent to any change that will deprive him of the pleasure of handing the Governor General such windfalls?
There is no law of any kind stating what a fine shall be; it is left entirely to the discretion of the Director of Customs: he generally goes upon an old legend of the department, that it should be $40 per tael; there is no reason for this, rather than for any other figure; anyhow it is just 16 times the value of the drug: remonstrances bring the reply that the vessel is liable to confiscation and that owners may think themselves very leniently dealt with: but the Director knows very well that he would never dare to confiscate a ship for having, say, $600 worth of contraband on board: it suits the purpose of the Administration much better to receive a good lump of a fine and to avoid further trouble.
The shipowners and agents of Hong Kong ask nothing...