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change their name or transfer to another locality. When a shop gives up business the licence must be surrendered. It is not transferable.
8. Shops importing foreign or native opium into Peking must report the amount to the police.
9. When a consignment of opium is ordered for the use of several opium shops the names of the purchasers must be entered on the passes issued by the police. The foils of these passes must be sent to the police for examination every month, and any opinm brought to Peking without such a pass will be treated as contraband.
10. Opium-smokers licences have been issued by the police, and to these licences is attached a seal slip of paper on which the amounts of opium purchased are to be noted.
11. When any opium is sold the amount must be noted on the above slip, and the 'chop" of the shop must also be affixed, together with the date.
12. Shops selling raw or prepared opium are required to provide themselves with small chops" giving the name of the shop, to be used as stated above.
13. Shops selling opium to persons not holding licences, or not in accordance with the amount stated on the licence, or failing to note the amount, &c., on the licence, will be liable to fine.
14. No opium must be sold to any person whose licence has expired or who has already purchased the amount permitted by his licence.
15. When opium ash is taken in exchange for prepared or raw opium the amount must be noted on the licence, and no opium can be given in exchange for opium ash to any person not holding a licence.
16. Opium shops are required to furnish monthly returns of their purchases and sales of opium,
17. The market price per (Chinese) ounce for the various kinds of prepared and raw opium must be written up above the counter.
18. No opium pipes may be kept in an opium shop, and, should the proprietor or his assistants hold opium-smokers' licences, they must consume the drug off the premises.
A general survey of the reports from the provinces goes to show that, while progress is being made, there is a great lack of uniformity in the practical steps being taken to enforce suppression, and it is this independent action on the part of the provincial authorities which renders a reliable estimate of actual achievement some- what difficult of attainment. Indeed, the Central Government in its desire to eradicate the evil would appear to an outsider to be too hasty in approving the multifarious proposals emanating from the provinces and to pay too little attention to uniformity of action. In Yunnan, for example, Proclamations have been posted fixing the close of the present Chinese year (the 21st January, 1909), as the date on which cultivation and consumption must cease, other provinces are following suit, while in others, again, different limits are given, and in Proclamations issued by separate authorities in the same prefecture of a province limits of three and ten years occur side by side. It is well understood that the Government are anxious to shorten the ten years limit, and yet while Yunnan, the second in importance of the opium- producing provinces, must, according to the Governor-General of Yunnan and Kueichow, cease all connection with opium in a few months, the Regulations for the issue of certificates to smokers in Peking, quoted above, state that the allowance will be reduced by one-eighth annually--in other words, the metropolis still adheres to the term originally fixed in 1906, Yunnan may be looked upon as a test case, and if the Governor-General of these south-western provinces succeeds in what is undoubtedly the herculean task of eradicating opium by the 21st January, 1909, it is not unlikely that the time limit will be reduced in the other provinces, where a more gradual reduction is recommended. His efforts, if not altogether to the liking of the farmers of Yunnan, are fully appreciated by the Central Government.
The acreage under poppy cultivation is in process of compilation by the local authorities throughout the various provinces, but nothing has yet been made public. In some provinces special deputies have been sent to check the reports, and in parts of Szechuan it is reported that plants have been uprooted by the farmers themselves rather than face inspection. There, too, the Governor-General has called for district returns of the yield of grain crops during the present year, and has given orders for the complete abolition of opium cultivation in all districts where drought or famine has caused shortage or distress. Wheat, beans, and other winter crops are to take its place. When the grain crops have been satisfactory a reduction of 50 per cent. in
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poppy cultivation next season is ordered, and the amount of reduction in future years is left over for further consideration. This action is not in accord with the approved proposals of the Board of Finance which will be referred to later.
From some of the inland provinces it is reported that little is being done to carry out those Regulations which deal with the issue of licences to smokers and the reduction of the craving for the drug, but this is not applicable to the country as a whole, for in many places smokers have been licensed, official and private refuges have been opened for the treatment of patients, and foreign and native anti-opium medicines are being sold and distributed gratuitously. At Canton, the most populous city in China, 130,000 licences were prepared for the city, while, after eighteen months, only some 20,000 were applied for, and the failure of the system is there attributed, in the main, to the treat- ment which respectable Chinese are alleged to receive at the hands of the police officials intrusted with their issue. It is stated, however, that the Regulations are being so strictly enforced that opium smoking is rapidly dying out among the middle and lower classes, and that all opium-boiling shops are closely watched by the police and their owners heavily fined for selling to unlicensed persons or quantities in excess of a smoker's allowance. But in some parts of the same province non-licensed smokers known to the opium shops can still purchase supplies, while in other parts soldiers are stationed at the entrance to see that the Regulations posted on the shop doors are strictly complied with.
Generally speaking, the licensing of wholesale and retail opium shops and of smokers is being enforced, and although some provinces display less energy than others it must be admitted that very considerable progress in this direction has already been made. Less attention, however, has as yet been paid to the inspection of opium shops.
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As regards anti-opium medicines, their number is legion. They are of native and foreign (principally Japanese) manufacture, and many of them coutain opium or morphia in varying quantities. The husk of the foreign opium ball made into pills is also sold as a cure, and most of the reports from the provinces draw attention to the serious evil which these so-called remedies are creating-an evil far worse than tho disease they are advertised to cure. Opium smokers are in many cases becoming opium or morphia eaters, and developing a craving which is still more difficult to eradicate. By the Regulations the manufacture of anti-opium medicines devoid of opium ash or morphia is encouraged, but the result is a phase of the opium question which remains untouched by the Chinese Government, although it is one which would appear to call for early supervision and control. An English missionary in the Province of Szechuan, where there is a wide field for curative medicines, imported from Singapore thirty sacks of the plant yielding what is known as the Malay anti-opium cure, and he reports that he had at the date of writing tried it ou about fifty persons and that in every case the medicine had effected a cure. The Anti- Opium Bureau of the Province of Chibli at. Tien-tsin has an arrangement with Mr. C. B. Towns,* the American opium expert referred to in last Report, for the cure of smokers. The Bureau issues passes in Chinese and English to smokers wishing to undergo this cure, Mr. Towns signs an English certificate that the patient has broken off the habit when the cure has been effected, and the Bureau thereupon issues to the party cured a Chinese certificate to that effect. Many who are not smokers of long standing are breaking off the habit by sheer will-power, while others who used to toy with the pipe now religiously avoid it for fear of contracting the craving,
In several provinces anti-opium bureaux have been established, and one of their functions is to test officials, whether smokers or non-smokers. At Chengtu, the capital of the Province of Szechuan, such a bureau was opened on the 8th July, and all persons holding official posts have cach to reside there for a period of three days. If during that time the craving does not manifest itself the person under observation is released and recorded as a non-smoker. Should the craving develop, a time limit for abandonment of the habit is assigned to the smoker, and at the expiry of the limit ho is subjected to a second test, failure to pass which brings dismissal from his post.
Refuges for the treatment of in-patients are quite common, and in juxtaposition are frequently found dispensers of native medicines for consumption by out-patients on the premises. Anti-opium Societies are also much in evidence, and although some doubt is thrown on their efficacy they are said to be of assistance to the police authorities in unearthing breaches of the Regulations. One of these Societies in the Canton Province offers small monetary prizes to smokers who break off the habit
* Mr. Towns has just opened a similar institute at Shanghae.
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