Chapter IV: Part 4

The vice of opium-smoking began to prevail in China in the second half of the 17th century,[199] and in another hundred years had spread like a plague over the gigantic empire. The first edict against the practice was issued in 1796, since which there have been innumerable enactments and memorials,[200] but all powerless to arrest the evil which is still increasing in an alarming ratio. Mr. Hughes, Commissioner of Customs at Amoy, thus wrote on this subject in his official _Trade Report_[201] for the year 1870:—“Opium-smoking appears here as elsewhere in China to be becoming yearly a more recognized habit,—almost a necessity of the people. Those who use the drug now do so openly, and native public opinion attaches no odium to its use, so long as it is not carried to excess.... In the city of Amoy, and in adjacent cities and towns, the proportion of opium-smokers is estimated to be from 15 to 20 per cent. of the adult population.... In the country the proportion is stated to be from 5 to 10 per cent....”

=Production=—The poppy in whatever region it may grow always contains a milky juice possessing the same properties; and the collection of opium is _possible_ in all temperate and subtropical countries where the rainfall is not excessive. But the production of the drug is limited by other conditions than soil and climate, among which the value of land and labour stands pre-eminent.

At the present day opium is produced on an important scale in Asia Minor, Persia, India, and China; to a small extent in Egypt. The drug has also been collected in Europe, Algeria,[202] North America,[203] and Australia[204] but more for the sake of experiment than as an object of commerce.

We shall describe the production of the different kinds under their several names.

1. _Opium of Asia Minor_; _Turkey, Smyrna, or Constantinople Opium_[205]—The poppy from which this most important kind of opium is obtained is _Papaver somniferum_, var. β. _glabrum_ Boissier. The flowers are commonly purplish, but sometimes white, and the seeds vary from white to dark violet.

The cultivation is carried on throughout Asia Minor, both on the more elevated and the lower lands, the cultivators being mostly small peasant proprietors. The plant requires a naturally rich and moist soil, further improved by manure, not to mention much care and attention on the part of the grower. Spring frosts, drought, or locusts sometimes effect its complete destruction. The sowing takes place at intervals from November to March, partly to insure against risk of total failure, and partly in order that the plants may not all come to perfection at the same time.

[199] Bretschneider, _Study of Chinese Bot. Works_, 1870. 48.

[200] _Chinese Repository_, vol. v. (1837) vi &c.

[201] Addressed to the Inspector-General of Customs, Pekin, and published at Shanghai, 1871

[202] _Pharm. Journ._ xv. (1856) 348.

[203] _Am. Journ. of Phar._ xviii. (1870) 124; _Journ. of Soc. of Arts_, Dec. 1, 1871.

[204] _Pharm. Journ._ Oct. 1, 1870. 272.

[205] Much information under this head has been derived from a paper _On the production of Opium in Asia Minor_ by S. H. Maltass (_Pharm. Journ._ xiv. 1855. 396), and one _On the Culture and Commerce in Opium in Asia Minor_, by E. R. Heffler, of Smyrna (_Pharm. Journ._ x. 1869. 434).

The plants flower between May and July according to the elevation of the land. A few days after the fall of the petals the poppy head being about an inch and a half in diameter is ready for incision. The incision is made with a knife transversely, about half-way up the capsule, and extends over about two-thirds the circumference, or is carried spirally to beyond its starting point. Great nicety is required not to cut too deep so as to penetrate the capsule, as in that case some of the juice would flow inside and be lost. The incisions are generally made in the afternoon and the next morning are found covered with exuded juice. This is scraped off with a knife, the gatherer transferring it to a poppy leaf which he holds in his left hand. At every alternate scraping, the knife is wetted with saliva by drawing it through the mouth, the object being to prevent the adhesion of the juice to the blade. Each poppy-head is, as a rule, cut only once; but as a plant produces several heads all of which are not of proper age at the same time, the operation of incising and gathering has to be gone over two or three times on the same plot of ground.

As soon as a sufficient quantity of the half-dried juice has been collected to form a cake or lump, it is wrapped in poppy leaves and put for a short time to dry in the shade. There is no given size for cakes of opium, and they vary in weight from a few ounces to more than two pounds. In some villages it is the practice to make the masses larger than in others. Before the opium is ready for the market, a meeting of buyers and sellers is held in each district, at which the price to be asked is discussed and settled,—the peasants being most of them in debt to the buyers or merchants.

To the latter the opium is sold in a very soft but natural state. These dealers sometimes manipulate the soft drug with a wooden pestle into larger masses which they envelope in poppy leaves and pack in cotton bags sealed at the mouth for transport to Smyrna. According to another account, the opium as obtained from the grower is at once packed in bags together with a quantity of the little chaffy fruits of a dock (_Rumex_ sp.) to prevent the lumps from sticking together, and so brought in baskets to Smyrna, or ports farther north.

The opium remains in the baskets (placed in cool warehouses to avoid loss of weight) till sold, and it is only on reaching the buyer’s warehouse that the seals are broken and the contents of the bags exposed. This is done in the presence of the buyer, seller, and a public examiner, the last of whom goes through the process of inspecting the drug piece by piece, throwing aside any of suspicions quality. Heffler of Smyrna asserts that the drug is divided into three qualities, viz.—the _prime_, which is not so much a selected quality as the opium of some esteemed districts,—the _current_, which is the mercantile quality and constitutes the great bulk of the crop,—and lastly the inferior or _chiqinti_.[206] The opium of very bad quality or wholly spurious he would place in a fourth category. Maltass applies the name _chiqinti_ (or _chicantee_) to opium of every degree of badness.

The examination of opium by the official expert is not conducted in any scientific method. His opinion of the drug is based on colour, odour, appearance and weight, and appears to be generally very correct. Fayk Bey (1867) has recommended the Turkish government to adopt the more certain method of assaying opium by chemical means.

[206] Probably signifying _refuse_,—_that which comes out_.

In Asia Minor the largest quantities of opium are now produced in the north-western districts of Karahissar Sahib, Balahissar, Kutaya, and Kiwa (or Geiveh), the last on the river Sakariyeh which runs into the Black Sea. These centres of large production of opium send a superior quality of the drug to Constantinople by way of Izmid; the best apparently from Bogaditch and Balikesri, near the Susurlu river. Angora and Amasia are other places in the north of Asia Minor whence opium is obtained.

In the centre of the peninsula Afium Karahissar (literally _opium-black-castle_) and Ushak are important localities for opium, which is also the case with Isbarta, Buldur and Hamid farther south. The product of these districts finds its way to Smyrna, in the immediate neighbourhood of which but little opium is produced. The export from Smyrna in 1871, in which year the crop was very large, was 5650 cases, valued at £784,500.[207]

_Turkey Opium_, as it is generally called in English trade, occurs in the form of rounded masses which according to their softness become more or less flattened or many-sided, or irregular by mutual pressure in the cases in which they are packed. There appears to be no rule as to their weight[208] which varies from an ounce up to more than 6 lb.; from ½ lb. to 2 lb. is however the most usual. The exterior is covered with the remains of poppy leaves strewn over with the _Rumex_ chaff before alluded to, which together make the lumps sufficiently dry to be easily handled. The consistence is such that the drug can be readily cut with a knife, or moulded between the fingers. The interior is moist and coarsely granular, varying in tint from a light chestnut to a blackish brown. Fine shreds of the epidermis of the poppy capsule are perceptible even to the naked eye, but are still more evident if the residue of opium washed with water, is moistened with dilute chromic acid (1 to 100). The odour of Turkey opium is peculiar, and though commonly described as narcotic and unpleasant, is to many persons far from disagreeable. The taste is bitter.

The substances alleged to be used for adulterating Turkey opium are sand, pounded poppy capsules, pulp of apricots or figs, gum tragacanth or even turpentine. Bits of lead are sometimes found in the lumps, also stones and masses of clay.

2. _Egyptian Opium_,—though not abundant little as formerly is still met with in European commerce. It usually occurs in hard, flattish cakes about 4 inches in diameter covered with the remnants of a poppy leaf, but not strewn over with rumex-fruits. We have also seen it (1873) as freshly imported, in a soft and plastic state. The fractured surface of this opium (when hard) is finely porous, of a dark liver-colour, shining here and there from imbedded particles of quartz or gum, and reddish-yellow points (of resin?). Under the microscope an abundance of starch granules is sometimes visible. The morphine in a sample from Merck amounted to 6 per cent.

[207] Consul Cumberbatch, _Trade Report for 1871_, presented to Parliament.

[208] The largest lump I have seen weighed 6 lb. 6 oz., being part of 65 packages which I examined 2nd July, 1873.—D. H.

According to Von Kremer who wrote in 1863,[209] there were then in Upper Egypt near Esneh, Kenneh, and Siout, as much as 10,000 _feddan_ (equal to about the same number of English acres) of land cultivated with the poppy from which opium was obtained in March, and seed in April. Hartmann[210] states that the cultivation is carried on by the government, and solely for the requirement of the sanitary establishments.

S. Stafford Allen in 1861 witnessed the collection of opium at Kenneh in Upper Egypt,[211] from a white-flowered poppy. An incision is made in the capsule by running a knife twice round it transversely, and the juice scraped off the following day with a sort of scoop-knife. The gatherings are collected on a leaf and placed in the sun to harden. The produce appeared extremely small and was said to be wholly used in the country.

Gastinel, director of the Experimental Garden at Cairo, and government inspector of pharmaceutical stores, has shown (1865) that the poppy in Egypt might yield a very good product containing 10 to 12 per cent. of morphine, and that the present bad quality of Egyptian opium is due to an over-moist soil, and a too early scarification of the capsule, whereby (not to mention wilful adulteration) the proportion of morphine is reduced to 3 or 4 per cent.

In 1872, 9636 lb. of opium, value £5023, were imported into the United Kingdom from Egypt.

3. _Persian Opium_.—Persia, probably the original home of the baneful practice of opium-eating, cultivates the drug chiefly in the central provinces where, according to Boissier, the plant grown to furnish it is _Papaver somniferum_, var. γ _album_ (_P. officinale_ Gm.) having ovate roundish capsules. Poppy heads from Persia which we saw at the Paris Exhibition in 1867, had vertical incisions and contained white seeds.

The strongest opium called in Persia _Teriak-e-Arabistani_ is obtained in the neighbourhood of Dizful and Shuster, east of the Lower Tigris. Good opium is likewise produced about Sari and Balfarush in the province of Mazanderan, and in the southern province of Kerman. The lowest quality which is mixed with starch and other matters, is sold in light brown sticks; it is made at Shahabdulazim, Kashan, and Kum.[212] A large quantity of opium appears to be produced in Khokan and Turkestan.

[209] _Aegypten, Forschungen über Land und Volk während eines 10 zehnjährigen Aufenthalts_, Leipzig, 1863.

[210] _Naturgeschichtl. medicin. Skizze der Nilländer_, Berlin, 1866. 353.

[211] _Pharm. Journ._ iv. (1863) 199.

[212] Polak, _Persien_, ii. (1865) 248, &c.

Persian opium is carried overland to China through Bokhara, Khokan and Kashgar;[213] but since 1864 it has also been extensively conveyed thither by sea, and it is now quoted in trade reports like that of Malwa, Patna, and Benares.[214] It is exported by way of Trebizond to Constantinople where it used to be worked up to imitate the opium of Asia Minor, and at the same time adulterated.[215] Since 1870, Persian opium which was previously rarely seen as such in Europe, has been imported in considerable quantity, being shipped now from Bushire and Bunder Abbas, in the Persian Gulf, to London or to the Straits Settlements and China. It occurs in various forms, the most typical being a short rounded cone weighing 6 to 10 ounces. We have also seen it in flat circular cakes, 1¼ lb. in weight. In both forms the drug was of firm consistence, a good opium-smell, and internally brown of a comparatively light tint. The surface was strewn over with remnants of stalks and leaves. Some of it had been collected with the use of oil as in Malwa (see p. 51), which was apparent from the greasiness of the cone, and the globules of oil visible when the drug was cut. The best samples of this drug as recently imported, have yielded 8 to 10·75 per cent. of morphine, reckoned on the opium in its moist state.[216]

[213] Powell, _Economic Products of the Punjab_, i. (1868) 294.

[214] Thus in the _Trade Report_ for Foochow, for 1870, addressed to Mr. Hart, Inspector-General of Customs, Pekin, is the following table:

Malwa. Patna. Benares. Persian. Imports of Opium in 1867 chests 2327 1673 724 300 ” ” 1868 ” 2460 1257 377 544 ” ” 1869 ” 2201 1340 410 493 ” ” 1870 ” 1849 1283 245 630

[215] Letter from Mr. Merck to Dr. F. 1863.

[216] Information kindly given us (9th June, 1873) by Mr. W. Dillworth Howard, of the firm of Howard and Sons, Stratford. A morphine manufacturer has no particular interest in ascertaining the amount of water in the opium he purchases. All he requires to know is the percentage of morphine which the drug contains. It is otherwise with the pharmaceutist, whose preparations have to be made with _dried opium_.

Carles,[217] from a specimen which seems to have been adulterated with sugar, obtained 8·40 per cent. of morphine, and 3·60 of narcotine, the drug not having been previously dried.

Inferior qualities of Persian opium have also been imported. Some that was soft black and extractiform afforded _undried_ only 3 to ½ per cent. of morphine (Howard); while some of very pale hue in small sticks, each wrapped in paper, yielded no more than 0·2 per cent.! (Howard). For further details, see p. 61.

In Turkestan an aqueous extract of poppy heads collected before maturity is prepared; it seems to be rich in alkaloids.[218]

4. _European Opium_—From numerous experiments made during the present century in Greece, Italy, France, Switzerland, Germany, England, and even in Sweden, it has been shown that in all these countries a very rich opium, not inferior to that of the East, can be produced.

The most numerous attempts at opium-growing in Europe have been made in France. But although the cultivation was recommended in the strongest terms by Guibourt,[219] who found in French opium the highest percentage of morphine yet observed (22·8 per cent.), it has never become a serious branch of industry.

Aubergier of Clermont-Ferrand has carried on the cultivation with great perseverance since 1844, and has succeeded in producing a very pure inspissated juice which he calls _Affium_, and which is said to contain uniformly[220] 10 per cent. of morphine. It is made up in cakes of 50 grammes, but is scarcely an article of wholesale commerce.[221]

Some careful and interesting scientific investigations relating to the production of opium in the neighbourhood of Amiens, were made by Decharme in 1855 to 1862.[222] He found 14,725 capsules incised within 6 days to afford 431 grammes of milky juice, yielding 205 grammes (= 47·6 per cent.) of dry opium containing 16 per cent. of morphine. Another sample of dried opium afforded 20 per cent. of morphine. Decharme observed that the amount of morphine diminished when the juice is very slowly dried,—a point of great importance deserving attention in India. The peculiar odour of opium as observable in the oriental drug, is developed, according to the same authority, by a kind of fermentation.[223] Adrian even suggests that morphine is formed only by a similar process, inasmuch as he could obtain none by exhausting fresh poppy capsules with acidulated alcohol, while capsules of the same crop yielded an opium rich in morphine.

[217] _Journ. de Pharm._ xvii (1873) 427.

[218] Fedschenko’s Catalogue of the Moscow Exhibition, Turkestan department, in Buchner’s _Repertorium für Pharmacie_, xxii. (1873) 221.

[219] _Journ. de Pharm._ xli. (1862) 184, 201.

[220] How this uniformity is insured we know not.

[221] Dorvault, _Officine_, éd. 8. 1872. 648.

[222] They are recorded in several pamphlets, for which we are indebted to the author, reprinted from the _Mém. de l’Acad. du déartement de la Somme_ and the _Mém. de l’Académie Stanislas_.

[223] _Journ. de Pharm._ vi. (1867) 222.

5. _=East Indian Opium=_—The principal region of British India distinguished for the production of opium is the central tract of the Ganges, comprising an area of about 600 miles in length, by 200 miles in width. It reaches from Dinajpur in the east, to Hazaribagh in the south, and Gorakhpur in the north, and extends westward to Agra, thus including the flat and thickly-populated districts of Behar and Benares. The amount of land here actually under poppy cultivation was estimated in 1871-72 as 560,000 acres.

The region second in importance for the culture of opium consists of the broad table-lands of Malwa, and the slopes of the Vindhya Hills, in the dominions of the Holkar.

Beyond these vast districts, the area under poppy cultivation is comparatively small,[224] yet it appears to be on the increase. Stewart[225] reports (1869) that the plant is grown (principally for opium) throughout the plains of the Punjab, but less commonly in the north-west. In the valley of the Biās, east of Lahore, it is cultivated up to nearly 7500 feet above the sea-level.

The manufacture of opium in these parts of India is not under any restriction as in Hindustan. Most districts, says Powell (1868),[226] cultivate the poppy to a certain extent, and produce a small quantity of indifferent opium for local consumption. The drug, however, is prepared in the Hill States, and the opium of Kūlū (E. of Lahore), is of excellent quality, and forms a staple article of trade in that region. Opium is also produced in Nepal, Basāhīr and Rāmpūr, and at Doda Kashtwar in the Jammū territory.[227] It is exported from these districts to Yarkand, Khutan, Aksu, and other Chinese provinces,—to the extent in 1862 of 210 _maunds_ (= 16,800 lb.). The Madras Presidency exports no opium at all.

The opium districts of Bengal[228] are divided into two agencies, those of Behar and Benares, which are under the control of officials residing respectively at Patna and Ghazipur. The opium is a government monopoly—that is to say, the cultivators are under an obligation to sell their produce to the government at a price agreed on beforehand; at the same time it is wholly optional with them, whether to enter on the cultivation or not.

[224] So we may infer from the fact that of the 39,225 chests which paid duty to Government at Bombay in 1872, 37,979 were Malwa opium, the remaining 1,246 being reckoned as from Guzerat.—_Statement of the Trade and Nav. of Bombay for 1871-72_, p. xv.

[225] _Punjab Plants_, Lahore, 1869. 10.

[226] _Op. cit._ i. 294.

[227] At the base of the Himalaya, S. and S.E. of Kashmir.

[228] Much of what follows respecting Bengal opium is derived from a paper by Eatwell, formerly First Assistant and Opium Examiner in the Government Factory at Ghazipur.—_Pharm. Journ._ xi. (1852) 269, &c.

The variety of poppy cultivated is the same as in Persia, namely, _P. somniferum_, var. γ _album_. As in Asia Minor, a moist and fertile soil is indispensable.[229] The plant is liable to injury by insects, excessive rain, hail, or the growth on its roots of a species of _Orobanche_.

In Behar the sowing takes place at the beginning of November, and the capsules are sacrificed in February or March (March or April in Malwa). This operation is performed with a peculiar instrument, called a _nushtur_, having three or four two-pointed blades, bound together with cotton thread.[230] In using the _nushtur_, only one set of points is brought into use at a time, the capsule being scarified vertically from base to summit. This scarification is repeated on different sides of the capsule at intervals of a few days, from two to six times. In many districts of Bengal, transverse cuts are made in the poppy-head as in Asia Minor.

The milky juice is scraped off early on the following morning with an iron scoop, which as it becomes filled is emptied into an earthen pot carried by the collector’s side. In Malwa a flat scraper is used which, as well as the fingers of the gatherer, is wetted from time to time with linseed oil to prevent the adhesion of the glutinous juice. All accounts represent the juice to be in a very moist state by reason of dew, which sometimes even washes it away; but so little is this moisture of the juice thought detrimental that, as Butter states,[231] the collectors in some places actually wash their scrapers in water, and add the washings to the collection of the morning!

The juice when brought home is a wet granular mass of pinkish colour; and in the bottom of the vessel in which it is contained, there collects a dark fluid resembling infusion of coffee, which is called _pasēwā_. The recent juice strongly reddens litmus, and blackens metallic iron. It is placed in a shallow earthen vessel, which is tilted in such a manner that the _pasēwā_ may drain off as long as there is any of it to be separated. This liquor is set aside in a covered vessel. The residual mass is now exposed to the air, though never to the sun, and turned over every few days to promote its attaining the proper degree of dryness, which according to the Benares regulations, allows of 30 per cent. of moisture. This drying operation occupies three or four weeks.

The drug is then taken to the Government factory for sale; previous to being sold it is examined for adulteration by a native expert, and its proportion of water is also carefully determined. Having been received into stock, it undergoes but little treatment beyond a thorough mixing, until it is required to be formed into globular cakes. This is effected in a somewhat complicated manner, the opium being strictly of standard consistence. First the quantity of opium is weighed out, and having been formed into a ball is enveloped in a crust of dried poppy petals, skilfully agglutinated one over the other by means of a liquid called _lēwā_. This consists partly of good opium, partly of _pasēwā_, and partly of opium of inferior quality, all being mixed with the washings of the various pots and vessels which have contained opium, and then evaporated to a thick fluid, 100 grains of which should afford 53 of dry residue. These various things are used to form a ball of opium in the following proportions:—

[229] It is said (1873) that the ground devoted to poppy-culture in Bengal is becoming impoverished, and that the plant no longer attains its usual dimensions.

[230] For figures of the instrument, see _Pharm. Journ._ xi. (1862) 207.

[231] _Pharm. Journ._ xi. (1852) 209.

seers. chittaks.
Opium of standard consistence 1 7·50
” contained in _lēwā_ 3·75
Poppy petals 5·43
Fine _trash_ 0·50
-----------
2 1·18 = about 4 lb. 3½ oz.
avoirdupois.
-----------

The finished balls usually termed _cakes_, which are quite spherical and have a diameter of 6 inches, are rolled in _poppy trash_ which is the name given to the coarsely powdered stalks, capsules and leaves of the plant; they are then placed in small dishes and exposed to the direct influence of the sun. Should any become distended, it is at once opened, the gas allowed to escape, and the cake made up again. After three days the cakes are placed, by the end of July, in frames in the factory where the air is allowed to circulate. They still however require constant watching and turning, as they are liable to contract mildew which has to be removed by rubbing in _poppy trash_. By October the cakes have become perfectly dry externally and quite hard, and are in condition to be packed in cases (40 cakes in each) for the China market which consumes the great bulk of the manufacture.

For consumption in India the drug is prepared in a different shape. It is inspissated by solar heat till it contains only 10 per cent. of moisture, in which state it is formed into square cages of 2 lb. each which are wrapped in oil paper, or it is made into flat square tablets. Such a drug is known as _Abkāri Opium_.

The Government opium factories in Bengal are conducted on the most orderly system. The care bestowed in selecting the drug, and in excluding any that is damaged or adulterated is such that the merchants who purchase the commodity rarely require to examine it, although permission is freely accorded to open at each sale any number of chests or cakes they may desire. In the year 1871-72 the number of chests sold was 49,695, the price being £139 per chest, which is £26 higher than the average of the preceding year. The net profit on each chest was £90.[232]

In Malwa the manufacture of opium is left entirely to private enterprise, the profit to Government being derived from an export duty of 600 rupees (£60) per chest.[233] As may readily be supposed, the drug is of much less uniform quality than that which has passed through the Bengal agencies, and having no guarantee as to purity it commands less confidence.

[232] _Statement exhibiting the moral and material progress and condition of India during the year_ 1871-72,—Blue Book ordered to be printed 29th July, 1873. p. 10.

[233] The revenue by this duty upon opium exported from Bombay in the year 1871-72, was £2,353,500.

Malwa opium is not made into balls, but into rectangular masses, or bricks which are not cased in poppy petals; it contains as much as 95 per cent. of dry opium. Some opium sold in London as _Malwa Opium_ in 1870 had the form of rounded masses covered with vegetable remains. It was of firm consistence, dark colour, and rather smoky odour. W. D. Howard obtained from it (_undried_) 9 per cent. of morphine. Other importations afforded the same chemist 4·8 and 6 per cent. respectively.

The chests of Patna opium hold 120 catties or 160 lb. Those of Malwa opium 1 pecul or 133⅓ lb.

The quantity of opium produced in India cannot be ascertained, but the amount exported[234] is accurately known. Thus from British India the exports in the year ending March 31, 1872, were 93,364 chests valued at £13,365,228. Of this quantity Bengal furnished 49,455 chests, Bombay 43,909 chests: they were exported thus:—

To China 85,470 chests.
The Straits Settlements 7,845 ”
Ceylon, Java, Mauritius and Bourbon 38 ”
The United Kingdom 4 ”
Other countries 7 ”
------
Total 93,364 ”
------

The net revenue to the Government of India from opium in the year 1871-72 was £7,657,213.

6. _=Chinese Opium=_—China consumes not only nine-tenths of the opium exported from India, and a considerable quantity of that produced in Asia Minor, but the whole of what is raised in her own provinces. How large is this last quantity we shall endeavour to show.

The drug is mentioned as a production of Yunnan in a history of that province, of which the latest edition appeared in 1736. But it is only very recently that its cultivation in China has assumed such large proportions as to threaten serious competition with that in India.[235]

In a _Report upon the Trade of Hankow_ for 1869, addressed to Mr. Hart, Inspector-General of Customs, Pekin, we find _Notes of a journey through the opium districts of Szechuen_, undertaken for the special purpose of obtaining information about the drug.[236] From these notes it appears that the estimated crop of the province for 1869 was 4235 peculs (= 564,666 lb.). This was considered _small_, and the Szechuen opium merchants asserted that 6000 peculs was a fair average. The same authorities estimated the annual yield of the province of Kweichow at 15,000, and of Yunnan at 20,000 peculs, making a total of 41,000 peculs or 5,466,666 lb. In 1869 also, Sir R. Alcock reported that about two-thirds of the province of Szechuen and one-third of that of Yunnan were devoted to opium.[237]

Mr. Consul Markham states[238] that the province of Shensi likewise furnishes important supplies. Mr. Edkins the well-known missionary has lately pointed out from personal observation[238] the extensive cultivation of the poppy in the north-eastern province of Shantung.

[234] _Annual Statement of the Trade and Navigation of British India with foreign countries_, published by order of the Governor-General, Calcutta, 1872. 52.

[235] In the _Report on the Trade of Hankow for 1869_ addressed to Mr. Hart, Inspector-General of Customs, Pekin, it is stated—“The importation of opium is considerably short for the last two seasons, but this is not to be wondered at now that each opium-shopkeeper in this and the surrounding districts advertises native drug for sale.”

W. H. Medhurst, British Consul at Shanghai, says—“The drug is now being so extensively produced by the Chinese upon their own soil as sensibly to affect the demand for the India-grown commodity.”—_Foreigner in Far Cathay_, Lond. 1872. 20.

The quantity of opium exported from Bombay in 1871-72 was less by 1719 chests than that exported in 1870-71, the decrease being attributed to the present large cultivation in China.—_Statement of the Trade and Nav. of Bombay for 1871-72_, pp. xii. xvi.

[236] According to the French missionaries, the cultivation of the poppy in the great province of Szechuen was hardly known even so recently as 1840.

[237] _Calcutta Blue Book_, p. 205.

[238] _Journ. of Soc. of Arts_, Sept. (1872) 6, p. 338.

Opium of very fair quality is now produced about Ninguta (lat. 44°) in north-eastern Manchuria, a region having a rigorous winter climate. Consul Adkins of Newchwang who visited this district in 1871, reports that the opium is inspissated in the sun until hard enough to be wrapped in poppy leaves, and that its price on the spot is equal to about 1s. per ounce.[239]

Shensi opium is said to be the best, then that of Yunnan. But Chinese consumers mostly regard home-grown opium as inferior in strength and flavour, and only fit for use when mixed with the Indian drug.[240]

It must not be supposed that the growing of opium in China has passed unnoticed by the Chinese Government. Whatever may be the nature of the sanction now accorded to this branch of industry, it was “rigorously” prohibited, at least in some provinces, about ten years ago, the effect of the prohibition being to stimulate the foreign importations. Thus at Shanghai in 1865, the importation of Benares opium was 2637 peculs,[241] being more than double that of the previous year, and Persian opium, very rarely seen before, was imported to the extent of 533 peculs, besides about 70 peculs of Turkish.[242]

Of the growth of the trade in opium between India and China, the following figures[243] will give some idea: value of exports in

1852-53—£6,470,915. 1861-62—£9,704,972. 1871-72—£11,605,577.

and[244]

In 1872 1873 1874 1875 1876
Chests opium, 93,364 82,908 88,727 94,746 88,350
Value, £13,365,228 11,426,280 11,341,857 11,956,972 11,148,426

In 1877 the imports of opium in Hong Kong were stated to consist of 6818 peculs, valued at 2,380,665 taels, coming from Patna (2158 peculs), Benares (3596 peculs), Persia (1041 peculs), Malwa (10 peculs), Turkey (3⅓ peculs). In the same year 4043 peculs of opium were imported in Amoy.

Poppy cultivation in the south-west of China has been briefly described by Thorel,[245] from whose remarks it would appear to be exactly like that of India. The poppy is white-flowered; the head is wounded with a three-bladed knife, in a series of 3 to 5 vertical incisions, and the exuded juice is scraped off and transferred to a small pot suspended at the waist. How the drug is finished off we know not. A Chinese account states simply that the best opium is sun-dried. But little is known of its physical and chemical properties. Thorel speaks of it as a soft substance resembling an extract. Dr. R. A. Jamieson[246] describes a sample submitted to him as a flat cake enveloped in the sheathing petiole of bamboo; externally it was a blackish-brown, glutinous substance, dry and brittle on the outside. It lost by drying 18 per cent. of water, and afforded upon incineration 7·5 per cent. of ash. In 100 grains of the (undried) drug, there were found 5·9 of morphine, and 7·5 of narcotine. (See also p. 62.)

[239] _North China Herald_, June 28, 1873.

[240] _Reports of H.M. Consuls in China_, 1871 (No. 3, 1872), 1874 (No. 5, 1875), p. 4, 23.

[241] One pecul = 133⅓ lb.

[242] _Reports on the Trade at the Treaty Ports in China for 1865._ 125.

[243] Taken from the _Annual Statement of the Trade and Navigation of British India with foreign countries_, published by order of the Governor-General, Calcutta, 1872—199.

[244] _Statistical Abstract relating to British India_ from 1866-67 to 1875-76. London, 1877, pp. 51, 53.

[245] _Notes médicales du voyage d’exploration du Mékong et de Cochinchine_, Paris, 1870. 23.

[246] _Report on the Trade of Hankow_, before quoted.

The Chinese who prepare opium for use by converting it into an aqueous extract which they smoke, do not estimate the value of the drug according to its richness in morphine, but by peculiarities of aroma and degree of solubility. In China the preparation of opium for smoking is a special business, not beneath the notice even of Europeans.[247]

7. _=Zambezi=_ or _=Mozambik Opium=_—From a notice in Pharm. Journal viii. (1878) 1007, it would appear that the Portuguese have formed in 1877 a large company called the “Mozambique Opium Cultivating and Trading Company.”

=Description=—The leading characteristics of each kind of opium have been already noticed. The following remarks bear chiefly on the microscopic appearances of the drug.

As will be presently shown, a more or less considerable part of the drug consists of peculiar substances which are mostly crystallizable and are many of them present in a crystalline state in the drug itself. All kinds of opium appear more or less crystalline when a little in a dry state is triturated with benzol and examined under the microscope. The forms are various: opium from Asia Minor exhibits needles and short imperfect crystals usually not in large quantity, whereas Indian and still more Persian opium is not only highly crystalline but shows a variety of forms which become beautifully evident when seen by polarized light. In several kinds large crystals occur which are doubtless sugar, either intentionally mixed or naturally present. The crystals seen in opium are not however sufficiently developed to warrant positive conclusions as to their nature, besides which the opium constituents when pure are capable under slightly varied circumstances of assuming very different forms. Hence the attempt to obtain from solutions crystals which shall be comparable with those of the same substances in a state of purity often fails. Some interesting observations in this direction were made by Deane and Brady in 1864-5.[248]

All opium has a peculiar narcotic odour and a sharp bitter taste.

=Chemical Composition=—Poppy-juice like analogous vegetable fluids is a mixture of several substances in variable proportion. With the commoner substances which constitute the great bulk of the drug we are not yet sufficiently acquainted.

[247] In 1870, a British firm at Amoy opened an establishment for preparing opium for the supply of the Chinese in California and Australia—_Pall Mall Gazette_, Nov. 7th, 1878, p. 7, announces: “The monopoly of preparing and selling opium in the 14 districts of Kwang-chow-fu, has been leased to a Hong at Canton for 3 years, ... innovation on former practice.... Opium shops are henceforth to be licensed, and the Exchequer will receive the yearly sum of 140,000 dollars—a welcome addition to the revenue.”

[248] _Pharm. Journ._ vi. 234; vii. 183. with 4 beautiful plates representing the crystallizations from extract and tincture of opium as well as from the pure opium constituents. When the juice of the poppy is prevented from rapid drying by the addition of a little glycerin, crystals are developed in it.

In the first place (independently of water) there is found mucilage distinct from that of gum arabic, also pectic matter,[249] and albumin. These bodies, together with unavoidable fragments of the poppy capsules, probably amount on an average to more than half the weight of the opium.[250]

In addition to these substances, the juice also contains sugar in solution,—in French opium to the extent of 6½ to 8 per cent.: according to Decharme it is uncrystallizable. Sugar also exists in other opium, but whether always naturally has not been determined.

Fresh poppy-juice contains in the form of emulsion, wax, pectin, albumin and insoluble calcareous salts. When good Turkey opium is treated with water these substances remain in the residue to the extent of 6 to 10 per cent.

Hesse (1870) has isolated the _wax_ by exhausting the refuse of opium with boiling alcohol and a little lime. He thus obtained a crystalline mass from which he separated by chloroform _Palmitate_ and _Cerotate of Cerotyl_, the former in the larger proportion.

The presence of _Caoutchouc_ has also been pointed out; Procter[251] found opium produced in Vermont to contain about 11 per cent. of that substance, together with a little fatty matter and resin.

Respecting the colouring matter and an extremely small quantity of a volatile body with pepper-like odour, we know but little. After the colouring matter has been precipitated from an aqueous solution of opium by lead acetate, the liquid becomes again coloured by exposure to the air. As to the volatile body, it may be removed by acetone or benzol, but has not yet been isolated.

The salts of inorganic bases, chiefly of calcium, magnesium and potassium, contain partly the ordinary acids such as phosphoric and sulphuric, and partly an acid peculiar to the poppy.

Good opium of Asia Minor dried at 100° C. yields 4 to 8 per cent. of ash.

Poppy-juice contains neither starch nor tannic acid, the absence of which easily detected substances affords one criterion for judging of the purity of the drug.

The proportion of water in opium is very variable. In drying Turkey opium previous to pulverization and for other pharmaceutical purposes, the average loss is about 12½ per cent.[252] Bengal opium, which resembles a soft black extract, is manufactured so as to contain 30 per cent. of water.

[249] We had the opportunity of examining very good specimens of pectic matter and caoutchouc from opium, with which we were presented (1879) by Messrs. J. F. Macfarlane & Co., of London and Edinburgh.

[250] Flückiger, in _Pharm. Journ._ x. (1869) 208.

[251] _American Journ. of Pharm._, 1870. 124.

[252] From the laboratory accounts of Messrs. Allen and Hanburys, London, by which it appears that 200 lb. of Turkey opium dried at various times in the course of 10 years lost in weight 25¼ lb.

As the active constituents of opium, or at all events the morphine, can be completely extracted by cold water, the proportion of soluble matter is of practical importance. In good opium of Asia Minor previously dried, the extract (dried at 100° C.) always amounts to between 55 and 66 per cent.,—generally to more than 60, thus affording in many instances a test of the pureness of the drug. Dried Indian opium yields from 60 to 68 per cent. of matter soluble in cold water.[253]

The peculiar constituents of opium are of basic, acid, or neutral nature. Some of these substances were observed in opium as early as the 17th and 18th century, and designated _Magisterium Opii_. Bucholz in 1802 vainly endeavoured to obtain a salt from the extract by crystallization. In 1803, however, Charles Derosne, an apothecary of Paris, in diluting a syrupy aqueous extract of opium, observed crystals of the substance now called _Narcotine_, which he prepared pure. He believed that the same body was obtained by precipitating the mother liquor with an alkali, but what he so got was morphine. It is needless to pursue the further researches of Derosne. Ingenious as they were, it was reserved for Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner, apothecary of Einbeck in Hanover (_nat. 1783_, _ob. 1841_) to discover their true interpretation.

Sertürner had been engaged since 1805 with the chemical investigation of opium, and in 1816 he summarized his results in the statement that he had enriched science (we now translate his own words[254])—“not only with the knowledge of a remarkable new vegetable acid [_Mekonsäure_ (meconic acid) which he had made known as _Opiumsäure_ in 1806], but also with the discovery of a new alkaline salifiable base, _Morphium_, one of the most remarkable substances, and apparently related to ammonia.” Sertürner in fact distinctly recognised the basic nature and the organic constitution of morphium (now called _Morphine_, _Morphia_, or _Morphinum_), and prepared a number of its crystalline salts. He likewise demonstrated the poisonous nature of these substances by experiments on himself and others. Lastly, he pointed out, though very incorrectly, the difference between morphine and the so-called _Opium-salt_ (Narcotine) of Derosne. It is possible that this latter chemist may have had morphine in his hands at the same time as Sertürner, or even earlier. This honour is also due to Séguin, whose paper “_Sur l’Opium_” read at the Institute, December 24, 1804, was, strange to say, not published till 1814.[255] To Sertürner, however, undoubtedly belongs the merit of first making known the existence of organic alkalis in the vegetable kingdom,[256]—a series of bodies practically interminable. As to opium, it still remains after nearly seventy years a _nidus_ of new substances.

Solutions of morphine in acids or in alkalis rotate the plane of polarization to the left.

The morphine in opium is combined with meconic acid, and is therefore easily soluble in water.[257] The _Narcotine_ is present in the free state, and can be extracted by chloroform, boiling alcohol, benzol, ether, or volatile oils,[258] but not by water. It dissolves in 3 parts of chloroform, in 20 of boiling alcohol, in 21 of benzol, in 40 of boiling ether. Its alkaline properties are very weak, and it does not affect vegetable colours. If we examine opium by the microscope we cannot at once detect the presence of narcotine, but if first moistened with glycerin, numerous large crystals may generally be found after the lapse of some days. If the opium has been previously exhausted with benzol or ether, in order to remove the narcotine, no such crystals will be formed. Hence it follows that narcotine pre-exists in an amorphous state.

[253] Calculated from official statements given by Eatwell in the paper quoted at p. 50.

[254] Gilbert’s _Annalen der Physik_, lv. (1817) 57.

[255] _Annales de Chimie_, xcii (1814) 225.

[256] The Institut de France on the 27th June, 1831, awarded to Sertürner a prize of 2000 francs—“pour avoir reconnu la nature alcaline de la morphine, et avoir ainsi ouvert une voie qui produit de grandes découvertes médicales.”

[257] There are exceptional cases in which it is asserted that water does _not_ take up the whole amount of morphine.

[258] In large crystals by means of oil of turpentine.

By decomposition with sulphuric acid, narcotine yields _Cotarnine_, an undoubted base, together with _Opianic Acid_, and certain derivatives of the latter.

The discovery of another base, _Codeine_, was made in 1832 by Robiquet. It dissolves in 17 parts of boiling water, forming a highly alkaline solution which perfectly saturates acids, and exhibits in polarized light a levogyre power. Codeine is also readily soluble at ordinary temperatures in 7 parts amylic alcohol, and in 11 of benzol.

The codeine of commerce is in very large crystals containing 2 atoms = 5·66 per cent. of water. By crystallization from ether the alkaloid may be obtained in small anhydrous crystals.

Since 1832 other alkaloids have been found in opium, as may be seen in the following table, which includes all the 17 now known.[259]

A very large number of derivatives of several among them have been prepared, of which we point out a few in smaller type. The molecular constitution of these opium alkaloids being not yet thoroughly settled, we add only their empirical formulæ, which however exhibit unmistakeable connections.

_Papaverosine_ discovered by Deschamps in poppy heads (p. 42) can hardly be absent from opium. In some points it appears to resemble cryptopine.

Among the peculiar non-basic constituents of opium, the first to call for notice is _Meconic Acid_, C₇H₄O₇, discovered, as already observed, by Sertürner in 1805. It is distinguished by the red colour which it produces with ferric salts, the same as that of ferric sulphocyanate; but the latter only dissolves in ether. Meconic acid is soluble in 4 parts of boiling water, but immediately gives off CO₂, and the remaining solution instead of depositing micaceous crystalline scales of meconic acid, yields on cooling (but best after boiling with hydrochloric acid) hard granular crystals of _Comenic Acid_, C₆H₄O₅.

_Lactic Acid_ was discovered by T. and H. Smith in the opium-liquors produced in the manufacture of morphine. These chemists regarded it as a peculiar body, and under the name of _Thebolactic Acid_, exhibited it together with its copper and morphine salts at the London International Exhibition of 1862. Its identity with ordinary lactic acid was ascertained by Stenhouse (whose experiments have not been published) and also by J. Y. Buchanan.[260] T. and H. Smith consider it to be a regular constituent of Turkey opium; they obtained it as a calcium salt to the amount of about 2 per cent., and have prepared it in this form and in a pure state to the extent of over 100 lb. In our opinion it is not an original constituent of poppy-juice.

[259] In 1851 Hinterberger described as a peculiar alkaloid, _Opianine_; Dr. Hesse has examined Hinterberger’s specimen of this body, and found (1875) it to consist of impure narcotine.

[260] _Berichte d. Deutsch. Chem. Gesellsch. zu Berlin_, iii. (1870) 182.

_NATURAL ALKALOIDS OF OPIUM_

_and a few of their Artificial Derivatives_.