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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
CHINA TRADE.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[19768]
No. 1.
352
[June 15.]
SECTION 1.
Colonial Office to Foreign Office.-(Received June 15.)
THE Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies presents his compliments to the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and is directed by the Secretary of State to transmit, for the information of Sir E. Grey with reference to the letter from the Colonial Department of the 26th February last, a copy of a despatch from the Acting Governor of Hong Kong on the subject of the opium traffic.
Downing Street, June 14, 1907.
(Confidential.)
Inclosure 1 in No. 1.
Acting Governor May to the Earl of Elgin.
My Lord,
Government House, Hong Kong, May 1, 1907. IN view of the prominence that the opium question has assumed, I have the honour to transmit, for your Lordship's information, copy of a letter addressed to Sir Matthew Nathan in July last by the representative Heads of British Churches and Missions in this Colony, on the subject of the system on which the traffic in opium is conducted in Hong Kong, and of the acknowledgment of this letter, and of the ultimate reply which Sir Matthew Nathan addressed to the writers.
Steps are being taken to embody in the Manual on Hygiene in use in the schools in this Colony a statement of the evil effects of the excessive use of opium and alcohol,
2. I entirely concur in the reply addressed by Sir Matthew Nathan to Archdeacon Banister, and I am convinced that events will prove that, if China is in earnest in her desire to restrict the smoking of opium by her people, she will find that the most effective way of accomplishing her object will be by establishing opium monopolies in the various provinces, thereby enhancing the price of the drug, and by educating the rising generation in the evil effects of over-indulgence in opium smoking.
3. As far as Hong Kong is concerned, the evil effects of opium smoking are not apparent among the Chinese population. As Captain Superintendent of Police for nine years and Superintendent of Victoria Gaol for five years, I have had exceptional opportunities of forming a judgment in the matter. In the former capacity I came into daily contact with scores of Chinese of all grades in the community, and, as head of the gaol, I had charge of a daily population of Chinese averaging over 450.
I have never met a Chinese in Hong Kong who was incapacitated from the performance of his daily avocation by the habit of smoking opium, and I have never known a case in which a prisoner was unable by reason of being deprived of the opium pipe, to undertake his appointed task of labour immediately on admission to the gaol. Nor is there on record in the gaol any case of a Chinese opium smoker being incapacitated by the sudden deprivation of the opium pipe.
4. On the other hand, it was not, in my experience, unusual to see European prisoners addicted to drink who bad, on admission to the gaol, to undergo treatment in hospital before they could be passed for labour; and I have, during my residence in this Colony, followed to the grave several Europeans in good positions in the Colony who have died of drink, and have seen the dismissal from the service and absolute ruin of scores of men in subordinate positions in the Government service.
5. As I explained to some of Sir Matthew Nathan's correspondents who interviewed me in January on the subject of their letter of July last, if a fresh field is desired for philanthropic endeavour in this Colony, the eradication of the habit of over-indulgence in intoxicating liquors among the European population, including the army and the is far more deserving of attention than the prevention of opium smoking by [2542 p-1]
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