This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
OPIUM.
[April 2415574
CONFIDENTIAL.
SECTION 1.
Rco 23 MAY 10,
[14082]
(No. 92.) Sir,
No. 1.
Mr. Max Müller to Sir Edward Grey.--(Received April 25.)
Peking, March 31, 1910, WITH reference to Sir John Jordan's despatch No. 387 of the 21st October last enclosing my general report on the opium question in China, I have the honour to report that
have received the following information since that date from His Majesty's consular officers in the provinces, from which it seems clear that further progress has attended the continued efforts of the central Government to suppress the cultivation of opium in China, and if the same may not perhaps be said of the result of their attempts to reduce its consumption, that must be attributed to the immense difficulty of the task and to the great temptation which the rising value of the drug offers to venal minor officials to be lax in the application of regulations in places not under the immediate control of their official superiors. In my report I dealt with the necessity of absolute prohibition as the only effective means of dealing with the cultivation problem, and demonstrated how orders for gradual reduction of the poppy- grown area proved too complicated for application in Szechuan. I now have the honour to transmit herewith copy of an interesting despatch from His Majesty's consul at Chungking which more than justifies my anticipations as to the probable result of the order for total prohibition in that province. It will be remembered that, in his report of the 18th September last year, Mr Sly gives his view that total prohibition is not possible, but says that, in the opinion of a well-informed Chinese, ultimate success depends on the reduction of the area of cultivation by 70 or 80 per cent, this season and the prevention of subsequent relaxation. It is eminently satisfactory to read in Mr. Smith's despatch that a prominent member of the Roman Catholic mission, who is in close touch with the agricultural population, estimates that the total area under opium cultivation does not exceed 20 per cent. of last season's area. Particulars from seventeen districts which include the largest opium-producing centres in eastern Szechuan show that in fifteen practically no opium is now grown. At Foochow alone officials, gentry, and farmers seem to have combined to ignore all regulations and reap a final grand harvest from a sown area 50 per cent. larger than that of 1908-9. The only other district in Szechuan from which an unsatisfactory reply was received to Mr. Smith's enquiries is that of Fengtu, where one-tenth of the previous season's crop is reported to have been grown. Bishop Bashford, who has just returned from al extended tour of the provinces of Kiangsi and Szechuan, says in an interview to the press that his investigations have convinced him of two things: 1st, that the Chinese Government is thoroughly in earnest in regard to the eradication of the opium habit; 2nd, that the Government is succeeding splendidly in its enlightened efforts to put a stop both to the habit and to the cultivation of the plant. He states that according to the testimony of thirty missionaries at Chungking, cultivation has ceased throughout the province, and the fields have been replanted with rice and vegetables, while in Kiangsi he says there is absolutely no opium grown. Before passing to reports from other provinces it may be added that it is quite remarkable that so great a change should have been effected with so little violent opposition in the economic conditions of a populous province formerly almost wholly dependent on the cultivation traffic of
opium.
His Majesty's consul-general at Yunnan-fu rep rts that the new Governor-General Li-Ching-Hsi has disappointed the inhabitants of the province of Yunnan in not relaxing the stringent regulations of his predecessor against the cultivation of opium. The new governor speedily dispelled any doubts as to his policy by depriving the magistrate of Ping-1 of his office and button for habitual disregard of the regulations In October last and connivance at opium smuggling across the border from Kweichow. the magistrate of Ch'iupei (some 90 miles south-west of Yunnan-fu) seized and burned 20,000 ounces of opium (about 60 cwts.) which had been smuggled in from Kweichow, and the owner committed suicide to escape further punishment. On the 2nd November His Majesty's consul-general reports that no less than 17,379 pipes and 29,949 Chinese ounces (about 16 cwts. 37 lbs.) of opium were publicly burned outside the south gate of
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