It is proposed, we are told, to limit slavery to minors—­freedom ensuing on the attainment of majority.  This would greatly ameliorate the evil, but the evil is so crying that it demands not amelioration, but extinction.  Let the legislators of China take for their model the provisions of British law, which make it possible to boast that “as soon as a slave touches British soil his fetters fall.”  Let them also follow that lofty legislation which defines the rights and provides for the well-being of the humblest subject.  Let the old system be uprooted before a new one is inaugurated, otherwise there is danger that the limiting of slavery to minors will leave those helpless creatures exposed to most of the wrongs that accompany a lifelong servitude.

The number and extent of the reforms decreed or effected are such as to make the present reign the most illustrious in the history of the Empire.  May we not hope that in dealing with polygamy and domestic slavery, the action of China will be such as to lift her out of the class of Turkey and Morocco into full companionship with the most enlightened nations of Europe and America.

[Page 302] III.

A NEW OPIUM WAR

The fiat has gone forth—­war is declared against an insidious enemy that has long been exhausting the resources of China and sapping the strength of her people.  She has resolved to rid herself at once and forever of the curse of opium.  The home production of the drug, and all the ramifications of the vice stand condemned by a decree from the throne, followed by a code of regulations designed not to limit, but to extirpate the monster evil.

In this bold stroke for social reform there can be no doubt that the Government is supported by the best sentiment of the whole country.  Most Chinese look upon opium as the beginning of their national sorrows.  In 1839 it involved them in their first war with the West; and that opened the way for a series of wars which issued in their capital being twice occupied by foreign forces.

Their first effort to shake off the incubus was accompanied by such displays of pride, ignorance and unlawful violence that Great Britain was forced to make war—­not to protect an illegal traffic, but to redress an outrage and to humble a haughty empire.  In this renewed onslaught the Chinese have exhibited so much good sense and moderation as to show that they have learned much from foreign intercourse during the sixty-seven years that have intervened.

[Page 303] Without making any appeal to the foreigner, they courageously resolved to deal with the evil in its domestic aspects.  Most of the mandarins are infected by it; and the licensed culture of the poppy has made the drug so cheap that even the poor are tempted to indulge.

The prohibitory edict asserts that of the adult population 30 or 40 per cent. are under the influence of the seductive poison.  This, by the way, gives an enormous total, far beyond any of the estimates of foreign writers.