These
flowers were of the reddish kind. In China they have the white, red
and purple varieties, which, as you gaze on them, seem to set the
fields aglow with fire and attract your gaze as if you were enchained
to the spot by an unseen power. The seeds are sown in November and
December, in rows which are eighteen inches apart, and four-fifths
of the opium used in China is the home-product, though it was not
so formerly. In March or April the poppy flowers according to the
climate, the soil, and the location. The opium is garnered in April or
May, and prepared for the market. The Chinese merchant values most of
all the Shense drug, while the Ynnan and the Szechuen drugs take next
rank. The opium is generally made into flat cakes and wrapped up in
folds of white paper. It is said that it was introduced into China in
the reign of Taitsu, between the years A.D. 1280 and 1295; but it is
worthy of note that up to the year 1736 it was imported only in small
quantities and employed simply for its medicinal properties, as a cure
for diarrhoea, dysentery, and fevers, hemorrhage and other ills.
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