Mr. Pethick’s views are of interest, not only because of his intelligence and
his long residence in China, during a portion of which he has held official
positions under our government, but especially because of his close and
confidential, perhaps we may say official or semi-official, relations with
Li-Hung Chang, the grand secretary and viceroy of this province. It is by no
means a violent presumption that Mr. Pethick’s letter reflects the views of
the viceroy, and so gains a value which makes it worthy of transmission to
you.
Moreover, the figures which he gives in elucidation of the disastrous
influence of the opium trade in China, in a purely commercial point of view,
are very impressive. When we see that China pays more for opium annually
than she receives for her whole exportation of silk, or than she receives
for her whole crop of tea, we can understand why intelligent Chinese
statesman, like the viceroy of this province, regarding the importation only
as a business transaction, deeply regret it.
But no figures can give even an approximate idea of the ruinous effects upon
the health and the demoralizing effects upon the character which are
produced by the rapidly increasing use of opium in this empire. One must
live here and see the wretched condition of the victims of the drug to
appreciate what a curse it is to this nation. It is a matter of
congratulation that so few of our citizens suffer themselves to be engaged
at all in its importation or sale.
In this connection I beg leave to refer you to Mr. Low’s dispatch No. 46, of
January 10, 1871, which contains some very interesting statistics and
comments on the subject.
[Inclosure in No. 65.]
Mr. Pethick to the
United States special commissioners to
China.
Tien-tsin, China, November 22, 1880.
Your Excellencies: I cannot deny myself the
liberty of writing to offer my congratulations upon your success at
Peking. A long official career in China and my present relations with
the grand secretary and viceroy Li, enable me to say with confidence
that the success which has crowned your efforts will have a marked
effect upon the welfare of humanity and civilization, at least in this
part of the world.
The question of Chinese immigration to the United States has been settled
in a way that will give satisfaction to both countries. But though the
solution of that vexed question was the end and aim of your mission, I
leave what has been accomplished to speak for and commend itself to our
people, as its bearings will be so well understood by them. My present
concern is with opium, a subject not quite so well understood at home as
the other.
It is a mistake to say that since the opium war with England in 1842, the
Chinese Government has never shown a genuine desire to limit or suppress
the opium traffic. The printed laws of the empire, imperial, edicts,
memorials from the members of the government at Peking and from the
provincial authorities, and remarks by the ministers of the Chinese
foreign office, addressed to the representatives of foreign governments
in documents and in conversation, fully attest the fact that China has
never consented to bear, without murmur, this great wrong which was
forced upon her. Nor because imperial edicts are set at naught, and the
cultivation of the poppy connived at by officials in some parts of the
country, is it fair to tax the government with indifference to the
spread of this evil. Blood and treasure were spent freely in combating
its introduction, and, though defeated in war, the government has not
remained a silent or unfeeling witness of this blight extending over the
country. The public archives down to the present time bear witness to
the fact. American merchants formerly shared in this traffic, and
American ships are ready even now to carry opium from place to place in
China. But the trade has fallen largely into the hands of Jews and
Parsees, British subjects, from India. Very few English mercantile firms
of reputation are concerned with it, save by employing their vessels to
carry it about. Yet the Chinese people make no such nice distinction as
to principals and accessories in this trade. They know that opium was
forced on the country by a war, that all foreign merchants and their
ships have engaged in the trade, and that any foreign vessel will carry
opium now. The common name with them for opium is “yang yao” (foreign drug), and the simple facts ever present in
their minds are that foreigners first brought opium into the country and
bring it still; and the efforts of their authorities to put it down have
no manner of effect upon foreigners. Thus Americans, as foreigners in
this country, and being free to deal in opium, come in for their share
of the opprobium equally with English merchants, and bring the fair fame
of Western civilization into disrepute.
To give a clear idea of the present extent of the foreign opium trade in
China, I will here quote some statistics, taken from the latest official
report of the foreign customs service of the Chinese Government; Chinese
weights and values are reduced, for convenience, into our own weights
and currency.
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Imports into China from foreign countries
during the year 1879.
|
|
Value. |
| 1. |
Opium (from India, under monopoly of the British Government,
11,073,333 pounds) |
$50,700,000 |
| 2. |
Cotton goods (from England and the United States) |
31,400,000 |
| 3. |
Woolen goods (chiefly from England) |
7,000,000 |
| 4. |
Metals (chiefly from England) |
5,700,000 |
| 5. |
Matches (chiefly from Europe) |
550,000 |
| 6. |
Kerosene oil (from the United States) |
1,000,000 |
| 7. |
Sundries (from all countries) |
18,000,000 |
|
Total value of all imports |
$114,350,000 |
Exports from China to foreign countries
during the year 1879.
|
|
Value. |
| 1. |
Tea, 265,000,000 pounds |
$46,000,000 |
| 2. |
Silk |
40,000,000 |
| 3. |
Sugar |
3,000,000 |
| 4. |
Sundries |
11,200,000 |
|
Total value of exports |
$100,200,000 |
| Value of whole foreign trade, export and import, for
the year 1879 |
$215,000,000 |
The total quantity of foreign opium imported during the year 1879 reached
a figure never attained before, namely, 83,050 piculs (11,073,333
pounds, over 5,000 tons), representing a value of 36,536,617 taels, or
about $ 51,000,000, and this formed very nearly one-half of the whole
foreign import trade. The amount imported has steadily and rapidly
increased from 52,000 peculs in 1864 to 82,000 in 1879. In 1879 the
import was 11,000 piculs (one picul, 133⅓ pounds) more than the previous
year.
This will show that the use of foreign opium is steadily and rapidly
increasing in China. To this is to be added the amount consumed in
Hong-Kong, and the amount re-exported thence for the use of the Chinese
in California, Australia, and elsewhere; and estimating 21,919 piculs as
smuggled from Hong-Kong into China, the customs authorities state that
“the total importation of opium into China would therefore appear to
have amounted in 1879 to 104,970 piculs,” (13,995,000 pounds over 6,000
tons).
This single article (opium) equals in value all the other goods brought
to China from foreign countries. Its value is greater than all the tea
sent out of China, or all the silk. For the 265,000,000 pounds of tea
China sends abroad, she is given 11,000,000 pounds of opium, and still
has $5,000,000 to pay for this opium in other goods, the opium being
worth nearly $51,000,000 and the tea but $46,000,000.
These figures establish quite enough for my purpose, which is to show
that the black stream of pollution which has so long flown out of India
into China has been increasing in volume and spreading its baneful
influence wider and wider. If this stream be not checked, the world may
soon despise China as a nation of opium-smokers, even as Judah was
reviled by the prophet for her abominations.
I take it for granted that the ill-effects, physical and moral, of
opium-smoking are known and admitted by intelligent and unprejudiced
people, and notwithstanding the fine-spun theories of various apologists
for the habit, it is enough here to refer to the positive condemnatory
testimony of native victims of the habit; to all intelligent and
respectable Chinese; to foreigners who have had much experience in the
country, and to the united opinion of the foreign medical faculty in
China from the earliest date of foreign intercourse to the present. The
British Government long ago abandoned its defense of the trade on moral grounds, and now sustain it simply and
confessedly for financial reasons.
Your excellencies have appeared in China at this juncture, and while
seeking to remedy a misfortune suffered by our country at the hands of
the Chinese, you have been mindful to redress a wrong long sustained by
China from the United States, for we have been more or less involved in
the opium trade in common with other foreign countries. This is an act
of common justice and national equity. It fulfills a moral obligation
which has rested upon our country to make amends for the wrong which has
so long had our tacit and implied approval. The United States by a bold
and noble declaration against opium now stand in the right before the
world and the God of nations.
It would be premature to forecast the good results which should follow
this act. You are aware of the profound effect it has had upon the
government at Peking and
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upon
the Viceroy Li. That effect, I feel certain, is not transitory. It has
encouraged long deferred hope; confirmed oft-defeated determination; it
has nerved the arm of the government with new strength, and we shall see
China once again grappling with the monster that is stealing away the
prosperity and energies of her people.
I feel proud to belong to a country capable of such an act of magnanimity
to a weaker one. It is an act of peace and good-will such as exalts a
nation, if we believe Holy Writ, far more than the conquests and
triumphs of war; and your excellencies will doubtless come to reflect
upon your work, so happily accomplished, with the pleasing consciousness
of a great duty performed before God and man in behalf of our
country.
I have the honor to be your excellencies’ obedient servant,
