comes up only mildew, or, what is worse, wickedness. It is just as true now as when it was written, that Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do. One great evil growing out of this droning of the many, is the unequal distribution of the work that must be done by somebody. Millions are to be fed, and who is to plow and sow? millions are to be clothed, and who will spin and weave? inventions are to be made, and who is to warp the brain that shall afterward warp | the iron; books are to be written, and who shall pick out the thoughts that breathe and words that burn? Not the idlers, surely.

Children are to be nurtured, and taught how the little bee improves his time, and builds his house, and stores his food, and how the ant gathers her treasures in the summer, and the industrious mole works at night. Forests are to be felled and ships built; level roads are to be cut through hilly countries; engines set running, and mill-wheels revolving; planks sawed, and shingles rived; telegraph wires strung the length and breadth of the land; dead forms turned inside out, and a living spirit breathed into the corpse of faith. Who shall do all these things? Who does them now? The few workers.

Are you not rebuked, O man of folded hands and scented curls, when, sitting in your stolidity, you oblige the ingenious mechanic or the diligent husbandman to turn aside for you? I suppose not-there is a crust of false pride gathered over you that prevents natural feeling; and not till it is broken by some sharp stroke of adverse fortune will you be able to see how mean you are.

We cannot excuse ourselves by any plea from the work which is to do and must be done at some time and by some person. We may keep back the world a century, if enough of us try; yet, as I said before, we shall have to work just as hard to pull it back as to set it forward, for there is no true rest but in labor, and of labor.

That it is dignified to do nothing is a conclusion which cannot grow naturally out of the American soil-how it came here matters not, but the sooner it is rooted up the better. It has spread itself profitlessly along the ground where meadows and cornfields should be, as it is.

We cannot all "create and fashion

forth" new things and marvelous things; but there is something for us all to do, and no one is so poor and so inefficient that there is no work for him to do. They may seem little things that we can | do, some of us; but if we can do but little, there is greater need that the little should be done, and who shall say what is little? for things are so joined and intertwined that the tiny and silent wheel is as necessary as the painted dial-plate, the small pin as the huge beam. Let us stand up in our places then, and work, for the good of ourselves and our fellows-in time and in eternity. Learning first what there is to do and what we are fit to do, let us do it with our might-there is work enough for us all-we cannot walk in the street without seeing work that is to be done; we cannot look about our houses without seeing work. And if we do our duty in ever so small a sphere, we have done good. We must not work too selfishly, for if we do so we defeat our aim, and in seeking another's good we benefit ourselves.

As I sat writing a little while past, one very hot day, the maid who lends the little service I require brought me a glass of water.

66

Mary, you look very tired and warm," I said; "but there is something I want you to do—are you willing?"

66

Certainly," she replied; "I am not tired at all."

I gave her a large fan, and told her to sit down and fan herself for ten minutes. A smile of happy surprise broke over her face, and sitting down, she began to fan me; and so we always receive back that which we do, or would do for another. In our own immediate circle we surely have some influence, and it is easy work to use that influence for good. The wants of those who serve us should be cared for, and in truth there is no other way of securing their kindly interest for us; and their immortal minds, as susceptible of advancement as our own, must be remembered. They must be educated in personal, as well as household cleanliness, for outward purity is not without its influence on the heart. Every good and refined woman (and goodness and refinement have a closer affinity than might at first be imagined) will exert a refining and elevating influence on all her household-and you will never find uncivil domestics 'where the

upon us.

mistress is worthy of the name. To do better works, they will force themselves unto others as we would be done by, embraces all of Christianity, and all of true politeness. There is no formula to be learned if the heart is imbued with the divine Spirit, and the plowman is often as really polite as the man of leisure. It would seem an easy work to do as we would be done by; but we find it a very hard work, most of us, and are contented with doing it by halves.

If much has been given us, much will be required; and when we see riches, let us remember how much more its possessor should do than we-they are only means with which he should work, and moth and rust will corrupt every treasure that is not laid up in heaven.

What is it but idleness that makes so much crime? The man or the woman who goes out in the dark to beg or to steal has not been at work in the sunshine; for this keeps the heart and the hands clean. When I see the miserable sheds and garrets, whence with feeble steps the wretched inhabitants come forth to beg a morsel of bread, I think it would be a good work to give them a portion of the earth, and let them strengthen their muscles by digging their bread out of it. The brooks are full of water, and they drink of stagnant pools; beds of sweet-smelling straw would grow in one season, and they sleep in filthy rags; seed waits for the planting, and they starve. The work of education has not been done for them, and without this they are not able to see the better way of life which wiser men can see for them.

Those who have the means disclaim the work of helping them in such way as will enable them presently to help themselves, and so rich and poor suffer on together. The rich man may keep his gold; but he cannot keep his health in the midst of infectious diseases, nor his children from the contagion of evil example. He may avoid doing good; but he cannot avoid doing harm-we must do something. He who invents a new loom or plants a corn-stalk where a weed has grown, has wrought no harder, perhaps, than he who has invented a new idleness; but he has blessed himself and others, while the latter has done neither. Let us be careful then to keep down our envy--we have no time for envy, and hatred, and malice, for these are the hardest works of all; but if we do not

We have not time for these, for though we keep busy all our lives we shall not do the good works which our hands find to do. Weeds come up while we are asleep, and what will our King say when he visits his garden, if he finds thorns instead of figs, and thistles where roses should be? Not, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Every day we hear the questions not only, "Where art thou?" but also, "Where is thy brother?" We must labor for ourselves and him. Who do most to bless the ages in which they live, and the times that follow them? Surely they who keep their thoughts plowing in the field of mind, or their hands tending the soil.

[For the National Magazine.]

THE OPIUM TRADE IN THE EAST-
THE TRADE IN CHINA.

these vessels have received the general de-
signation of " Opium Clippers," or "Run-
ners," and unfurl, as the guarantee of their
right to navigate those seas, the flag of
Some of these vessels
Great Britain.
sailing between India and China carry
from eight hundred to thirteen hundred
chests of opium, and from their admirable
sailing qualities are able to make two or
One of these ves-
three voyages a year.

sels is able to realize to its owners, from
the sale of the opium which it delivers in
China, an annual income of a million and
a half to two millions of dollars; and as
the trade is brisk, the cargo rapidly dis-
posed of, and the net profits of the trade
amount to at least fifteen per cent., a sin-

annual profit of $225,000 to $300,000.

is

E design in the present article to direct our attention more particularly than we were able to do in the preceding article to the extent of the opium traffic in China. We have already traced the history of this trade from its insignificant and unpromising origin in 1769 to the magnitude and importance which it had attained in 1834, the period at which the commercial privileges of the East India Company ceased, and when that great body of traders withdrew from direct connection with the traffic in China, only, however, to direct its attention with greater earnest-gle vessel yields to its owners a handsome ness and success to the cultivation of the poppy and the manufacture of the opium in India. By this time the trade, though universally known to be contraband, had assumed a regular character, and was carried on with impunity off the Bogue and along the eastern coast. The authorities at Canton had already become implicated in the trade; the fees paid for their connivance were well understood, and the highest persons in the province were not ashamed to participate in the large profits of the illegal trade. Up to that period the value of opium imported into China had averaged about $14,000,000 annually. The great body of the trade was carried on by means of ships stationed permanently at Lintin, on which the opium was stored, the owner giving his order for the delivering of the drug to the buyer, who always paid the money before receiving the opium, the price ranging at that time between $600 and $700 per chest.

One of the specified conditions of the opium sales at Calcutta and Bombay is, that it shall be immediately shipped from those ports. The ships employed in this service are built and fitted up expressly for the business, and are among the finest vessels to be found in the eastern seas. Most of them are constructed in the form of schooners or brigantines, with low hulls, and being well manned and well armed, they present much more the appearance of ships of war than of vessels engaged in lawful commerce; or better still, they are well calculated to give us a good idea of the lawless "buccaneers" which frequented the Spanish main. Being well adapted to cut the waves with remarkable speed,

For the seductive drug a ready market always open in China. The Indian vessels deliver it principally at Hongkong and Cum-sing-mun. The former is an island about eight miles in length, and from two to four miles in width, near the mouth of the Canton River, and about thirty-seven miles eastward of Macao. This island, after the termination of the war of 1840, was ceded outright and forever to her majesty, the Queen of England; and since that time a beautiful city, bearing the name of her majesty, has sprung up like magic on the island, and already more than $10,000,000 have been expended on public improvements. Most of the English officers in China reside here, and are supported by liberal salaries, at an aggregate expense of nearly $300,000 annually-the governor alone receiving a salary of $33,000. Hongkong is the great depôt of the opium trade in China, while at the same time Hongkong is a colonial possession of Great Britain! But then Hongkong is half the world's circumference from London, and as the opium traffic is contraband, of course no returns are made of the proceeds of the trade, and thus the good people of England are deceived; and the great fact that a new possession has been acquired by the war with China-a new province provided with an immense governmental establishment, to nourish and protect a trade, the greater part of which consists in the merciless traffic in opium-is lost in the hazy distance. It is convenient, after all, to have some antipodal possessions; for it is difficult even for people who can see gigantic

evils among their neighbors across the Atlantic Ocean, to penetrate clear through the earth and detect the existence of evils, though they should even wear more monstrous forms.

It may not be very agreeable intelligence to the British public, but the fact is incontestable, that the principal article of commerce at Hongkong is opium. It is here that are found the immense establishments of the two greatest opium houses in China; and in the beautiful harbor, one of the finest in the world, may be seen, all the year round, several large receivingships, from whose mast-heads fly the colors of Great Britain. Nay, more than this; with the boldness to assume the responsibilities of this nefarious traffic, the example of which was given to its servants and subjects by the Parliament of England, and as if in defiance of the authorities of China, in 1845 Governor Davis licensed the public sale of opium by retail in Hongkong! We cannot give a better account of this daring measure, than by quoting the following from a recent work on China, by R. Montgomery Martin, who was at the time Colonial Treasurer, and a member of the Executive Council of Hongkong. He says:—

"Twenty opium shops have been licensed in Hongkong within gun-shot of the Chinese empire, where such an offense is death! Hongkong has now, therefore, been made the lawful opium smoking-shop, where the most sensual, degraded, and depraved of the Chinese, may securely perpetrate crimes which degrade men far below the level of the brute, and revel in a

vice which destroys body and soul; which has no parallel in its fascinating seduction, in its inexpressible misery, or in its appalling ruin. When the governor proposed the conversion of Hongkong into a legalized opium shop, under the assumed license of our most gracious and religious sovereign, I felt bound, as a sworn member of Her Majesty's Council in China, to endeavor to dissuade him from this great crime; but no reasoning would induce him to follow the noble example of the Emperor of China, who, when urged to derive a revenue from the importation of opium, thus righteously recorded his sentiments in an answer which would have been worthy of a Christian monarch: It is true I cannot prevent the introduction of the flowing poison; gain-seeking and corrupt men will, for profit and sensuality, defeat my wishes; but nothing will induce me to derive a revenue from the vice and misery of my people! But money was deemed of more consequence in Hongkong than morality; it was determined, in the name of her majesty, to sell the permission to the highest bidder by public auction, of the exclusive right to poison the Chinese in Hongkong-and to open a given number of opium

shops, under the protection of the police, for the commission of this appalling vice. Would and established a smuggling depôt on their we have acted thus toward France or Russia, shores in a prohibited and terrific poison? We dare not. Why then should we legalize and protect this dreadful traffic on an island given to us by the government of China, as a residence and for commercial intercourse ?"

From this "smuggling depôt," as a great center, radiates the terrible traffic along the coast and through the interior of

China. We need not here trace the history of the extension of this traffic from the waters of Canton along the extended coast which the Chinese empire presents. The dealers in the drug soon became convinced of the inability of the government to enforce the laws and edicts which it had promulged against the trade, and impelled by the same insatiable thirst for gain which first induced them to participate in a traffic so dishonorable, the opium merchants began to make experimental voyages along the coast as early as 1820. Most of these adventurous trips were successful, and before long receiving-ships were stationed at various points on the eastern coast, and opium-clippers began to make regular trips of delivery from Hongkong to Shanghai. The ever-wakeful authorities of Great Britain in the East, convinced, from the experiments already made, of the practicability of extending British commerce to other ports in China, now turned their attention to this subject, and on the 27th of February, 1835, Sir G. B. Robinson, the successor of Lord Napier as Chief Superintendent of British trade in China, wrote the following to Viscount Lord Palmerston :

"From the period when the first ship, the Merope, Captain Parkins, in 1820-21, commenced the system of delivering opium at various places, I have closely questioned intelligent men who have had opportunities of making observations; and the result of my inquiries is the conviction, that the people are intensely desirous to engage in a traffic, certain to prove alike advantageous to themselves and foreigners;

that the mandarins are anxious to benefit thereby, but are reluctantly, perhaps, compelled to enforce the prohibitions regarding trade; and that an opening for alınost unbounded commercial operations would be the desirable effect of little more than a demonstration on the part of our government of a determination to establish a proper understanding in the political and commercial relations of the two countries."

That"little more than a demonstration on the part of our government," was made in the opium war of 1840, and now "the

system of delivering opium at various amount of 12,639 chests, and in 1834 they places" along the Chinese coast is perfect. amounted to 21,785 chests, which was Opium stations are numerous; large well- sold for about $14,454,193. In 1837 the manned and well-armed receiving-ships sales amounted to between 39,000 and begirt the eastern coast of China; with 40,000 chests, valued at $25,000,000. which is connected, on the one hand, an | During this time the trade was universally extensive line of fast-sailing brigantines known to be contraband. For nearly delivering to them every few days their forty years the Chinese authorities had supply of the pernicious drug; and on the done everything in their power to arrest other, any quantity of "fast-crabs" and the startling growth of a traffic which was scrambling dragons," manned by des- working such terrible havoc among the peradoes of the worst and lowest class, lives of the people, and which was proconveying the seductive poison along the ducing an exhausting drain upon the recoast and up the rivers. All the iniquities sources of the country, which were beof fraud, perjury, bribery, and even vio- coming already so greatly embarrassed as lence, the usual concomitants of contra- to call forth numerous memorials from the band trade, are practiced, and occasionally first men of the country, showing the fatal fatal collisions occur between them and consequences, not only to the imperial the native authorities. But then, "the treasury, but to the finances of the entire people are intensely desirous to engage in empire, if this dreadful traffic were pera traffic, certain to prove alike advan- mitted to continue. In 1838-39, a detertageous to themselves and foreigners," by mined effort was made on the part of the diffusing poverty and death among the outraged government to suppress the former, and filling the coffers of the latter; traffic. Edicts of the most stringent and then, 66 our government has made a character were issued from the imperial little more than a demonstration," and palace, enjoining the utmost vigilance thus a 66 proper understanding" has been upon the provincial authorities, and calling secured between the two countries; and upon them to use every possible means to "an opening for almost unbounded com- arrest the trade. Almost unlimited powers mercial operations" has been secured un- were granted to them to enable them to der the protection of the flag of "our most effect this desirable object, and degradagracious and religious sovereign." tion, and even death were held out before the local authorities as the consequence of their failure. These edicts were reproduced at Canton, and proclamations from the local authorities were almost daily issued, forbidding all natives from engaging in the traffic, and even threatening the consumers of the drug with death, while they declared to the foreigners engaged in the trade the determination of the government to break up and suppress entirely the smuggling in of opium. These decided movements arrested the trade, causing the merchants to surrender to the government about 20,000 chests of the contraband article, which were all destroyed at Canton, and which constituted a prominent feature among the causes leading to hostilities between England and China.

Under this arrangement, thirty-three vessels, possessing an aggregate tonnage of 12,416 tons, are known to be moored all the year round at different stations on the coast, and eighteen well-armed schooners and brigantines are constantly occupied in making voyages along the coast, delivering the drug to the receiving ships, and transporting the accumulated treasure to their princely owners. A large number of first-class vessels are known to be engaged in the trade between India and China, and large quantities of opium from Calcutta and Bombay are conveyed to China twice a month by the fine steamers of the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company.

But we must turn our attention more closely to the extent of this enormous traffic in China. From 1794 to 1820 the amount of opium imported varied from 3,000 to 7,000 chests annually; but the practicability of extending the trade along the coast having been successfully tested about that time, the importations rapidly increased, and in 1824 they reached the

During these years-from 1839 to 1842 a much smaller quantity of opium was brought into the country; but the demand being much greater than the supply, it sold for almost double its former price, bringing from $900 to $1,200 per chest. Many handsome fortunes were made at