[*] Sir Edmund Hornley, after nine years’ service as chief judge of the Supreme Court at Shanghai, delivered an opinion on the anti- opium movement in the following remarkable terms:—­“Of all the nonsense that is talked, there is none greater than that talked here and in England about the immorality and impiety of the opium trade.  It is simply sickening.  I have no sympathy with it, neither have I any sympathy with the owner of a gin-palace; but as long as China permits the growth of opium throughout the length and breadth of the land, taxes it, and pockets a large revenue from it,—­sympathy with her on the subject is simply ludicrous and misplaced.”—­(J.  W. Walker v.  Malcolm, 28th April 1875.)

But the following extract from a letter to the London and China Express, of 5th July 1875, part of which we have ventured to reproduce in italics, surpasses, both in fiction and naivete, anything it has ever been our lot to read on either side of this much-vexed question:—­“The fact is, that this tremendous evil is utterly beyond the control of politicians, or even philanthropists.  Nothing but the divine power of Christian life can cope with it, and though this process may be slow, it is sure.  Christian missions alone can deal with the opium traffic, now that it has attained such gigantic dimensions, and the despised missionaries are solving a problem which to statesmen is insoluble.  Those, therefore, who recognise the evils of opium- smoking will most effectually stay the plague by supporting Christian Protestant Missions in China.—­Yours faithfully,

    “An Old Residenter in China.

    “London, June 28, 1875.”

THIEVING

Nowhere can the monotony of exile be more advantageously relieved by studying dense masses of humanity under novel aspects than in China, where so much is still unknown, and where the bulk of which is generally looked upon as fact requires in most cases a leavening element of truth, in others nothing more nor less than flat contradiction.  The days are gone by for entertaining romances published as if they were bona fide books of travel, and the opening of China has enabled residents to smile at the audacity of the too mendacious Huc.  It has enabled them at the same time to view millions of human beings working out the problem of existence under conditions which by many persons in England are deemed to be totally incompatible with the happiness of the human race.  They behold all classes in China labouring seven days in every week, taking holidays as each may consider expedient with regard both to health and means, but without the mental and physical demoralisation supposed to be inseparable from a non-observance of the fourth commandment.  They see the unrestricted sale of spirituous liquors, unaccompanied by the scenes of brutality and violence which form such a striking contrast to the intellectual advancement of our age.