burgh there were only 17 pictures in all pur- seer may be said to have exhausted the poetchased by the committee at that price or ry of lower animal life, and from that very under it! We regard these facts as in the feeling, perhaps, is occasionally tempted to highest degree creditable to the Edinburgh step over into a higher region, the tasks Committee, and as entirely decisive in favour which Harvey assigns to himself remain inof the system under which they act. If we complete, because the poetry of human life might presume to offer advice to gentlemen is exhaustless. If the fact, so ably dwelt who know their duties so well, we should say, upon by one of the most active members of carry out still farther the principle by which the Committee in proposing the health of you are at present guided. Do not fear the Scottish Historical Painters on a recent that you will injure the funds of the Associa- occasion, be kept in view, and the delineation tion by adopting the only line of conduct of such national characteristics and customs which can secure the end for which it was as have powerfully influenced the current of instituted; but, on the contrary, be assured national events, be recognised as falling withthat public interest and support will grow, in the province of the historical painter, not year by year, as the conviction that you are less legitimately than the events themselves, in the right path grows stronger and then the school which has produced "the stronger. It is no doubt necessary that the Rent Day," "the Village Politicians," "the prizes should be sufficiently numerous to Curlers," and the like, is an historical school, open to all artists of real eminence or pro- and Harvey, with his "Preachings," "Bapmise-all, in short, who ought to live by the tisms," and "Communions," stands at the profession some remuneration for their top of it, as it at present exists. After Harlabour; for we could scarcely be said to vey, perhaps, comes Noel Paton, just issuencourage a school of art if we collected the ing forth into the world of reality from that whole of the funds annually into one glitter- dream-land which the exuberant fancy of his ing heap, and presented it to the dazzled youth had peopled so charmingly. Then eyes of one happy artist. No one man there are the brothers Faed, one still resiwould be likely to surpass his competitors dent in Edinburgh, the other in London, but so far as to merit so signal a preference, and both in the strictest sense pupils of the Edinif he did, it would scarcely be prudent to burgh school; there is, Erskine Nicol, who launch our whole artistic fortunes in the frail rents a summer-house in Connemara, and has bark of one human life. But, short of com- gone beyond the Irish themselves in appremitting this error, we believe the committee ciation of their national character; the brocan scarcely keep the prizes too high; and thers Lauder, whose artistic training would we are persuaded that, in the meantime, do honour to any school; and D. O. Hill, the Edinburgh Association is far more the gifted illustrator of the land of Burns, mindful than the London Union of the whom we have already mentioned as one of advice of the Select Committee: "The the founders of the Association. Of the Art Union must remember that its province younger sort are such names as Herdman, is not to secure the accumulation of a large Archer, Burr, Gavin, and a crowd of others fund in order to gratify a large number of destined yet to be better known. In porsubscribers, but to encourage and direct art, trait, we have the president of the Academy, as far as it may be enabled." Sir John Watson Gordon, whose "RenownBut the most conclusive argument in fa- ed Provost of Peterhead " was acknowledg. vour of the system of patronage adopted by ed to be the best portrait exhibited in Paris. the Association, is derived from the success We have Graham Gilbert of Glasgow, who which has attended the labours of the Scot- in vigour of drawing, and truth and warmth tish Academy since its formation, and the of colouring, is, we think justly, reputed to present condition of that School of Art which have outstripped the President himself; and these institutions were in common designed we have Colvin Smith, John Faed, and Macto foster. In every department of art we nee, all still resident in Scotland; whilst in find Scottish artists, at the present moment, London our country is represented by Thorholding an honourable, and in several, burn, Grant, Ross, Swinton, and Philip, who, among British artists at least, a confessedly were he to devote himself to portrait paintpre-eminent place. In the very highest of ing, would soon, we believe, surpass the all, we believe, we are within the limits of whole of his metropolitan competitors. In the strictest justice, when we say that Har- recent times we have had Raeburn, and vey is without an equal in this country, and Duncan, and Wilkie, the latter of whom we with very few superiors in Europe at all. In are almost unwilling to mention in this cateentire mastery of the subjects which he gory; though even as a portrait painter, we chooses it is true Landseer surpasses him; believe it would be difficult to find an Eng but how different the subjects! Whilst Land-lish name that merited to be placed against his, without going back to the days of Rey-sociation on painting and sculpture, we cannolds and Gainsborough. In landscape, it not but rejoice to see its principles extended will surprise many of our readers to be told to the patronage of art in its application to that we by no means appear to the same ad- manufactures. He who can add the dulce to vantage; and the names of Macculloch the utile in the meanest object which we see amongst the living, and Thomson of Dud- or handle, contributes towards the civilizadingston among the dead, (unless we reckon tion and humanization of mankind, and he Harvey as an occasional contributor,) are who encourages and heartens another to do the only ones that we can at all venture to so, shall assuredly not go unrewarded. That place over against those of Gainsborough, to such reward those gentlemen who have Richard Wilson, Turner, and Constable. founded the Art-Manufacture Association But it is in the region of pure form that the are entitled, no civilised man will doubt who most unequivocal test of artistic ability is has spent half an hour in the Exhibition, or ten afforded; and this test we have stood in a minutes over the interesting catalogue by manner which leaves no further question as which it is illustrated. to the capabilities of our countrymen. Gibson we claim the greatest of all European sculptors since Thorwaldsen's death, or at any rate we contest the palm with the best of the Germans, such as Rauch and Kiss, and between him and Laurence Macdonald ART. VIII.-1. Copy of a Minute by the it is doubtful whether Tenerani can be named. Steell and Brodie. 3. Marquis of Dalhousie, dated the 28th day The Rise and Progress of the British A Word about Opium. (Published by But though the names which we have here thrown hastily together, when taken in conjunction with the limited resources of Scotland, may well be read with honest pride, we are very far from putting the claims of Scottish art very high absolutely, or even comparatively, if the comparison is to range beyond the existing schools of modern Europe. Our opinion of it, when measured by higher standards, we expressed in these pages very fully several years ago;* and to some of the suggestions, and not a few of the strictures which we then ventured to put forth, we cannot but think that the attention of many of our 4. artists might still be directed with advantage. But it is by no means our intention to recur at present to this wide and endlessly interest- 5. The Friend of India. No. for December ing field of discussion. Our object is to do justice to what we may denominate an æsthetico-economical institution, with the constitution and merits of which we were then very imperfectly acquainted. If art is to flourish at all in this country it must be by means of an organized system of patronage, which, springing from the people, is dispen-9. sed by a criticism higher than that of popular taste; and we have no hesitation in commending to the warmest sympathies of our countrymen, an institution by means of which this object has already been attained in a very remarkable degree. Holding such opinions as regards the influence of the As *The Fine Arts in Edinburgh, 1851. 6. 7. 8. 21, 1854. The Calcutta Gazette. 1854. December 13, The Chinese Missionary Gleaner. December 1856. (From the Seven Letters on the Opium Trade. (From the "British Banner.") The Opium Monopoly. "Times," August 14, 1855.) 10. Second Annual Report of the China Mission at Amoy. Edinburgh, December 1856. 11. Occasional Paper of the Edinburgh Me- ber 18, 1856.) Why does not India pro- of all men, and upon the consciences of those duce more Cotton? more immediately concerned. In entering upon the case we put far from us the thought of decorating an argument so as to beguile the reader, and to touch his feelings or warp his judgment. The bare facts need no dressing up: the inferences ensue without any skill in the reasoning. But we are well entitled to the reader's most careful attention; and we demand it in the name of humanity and in the name of ONCE and again, during the last twentyfive years, the attention of the British public has been loudly challenged in regard to the painful and perplexing subject now before us, namely, the trade in opium, and particularly the bearing of that trade upon the welfare of the people of China. There are specific reasons just now for repeating this challenge, and for endeavouring to bring the Christian consistency. Although some facts thereto belonging under the eye of all thoughtful and humane persons. This, therefore, is what we are proposing to do within our own sphere the circle of the readers of this journal. may believe that they are already familiar with the details of the subject-a subject which has repeatedly been brought forward in a variety of modes, we shall think it needful, in the present instance, to state the facts anew, and to do so as if they were not very distinctly apprehended by those to whom we address ourselves. The feeling with many such persons has been, and is still, that the opium traffic of the East India Companya contraband traffic-with China, is a subject not more We confine ourselves at this time to so deplorable and humiliating than it is hope- much of the general subject as relates to the less, as to any possible alteration for the East India Opium Trade with CHINA; and, better. There are many, and they are con- as thus limited, the foremost fact, a true siderate persons too, who, when asked to knowledge of which is essential to a comgive an ear to any suggestions on this sub-prehension of the problem, is—the physical, ject, turn away with the apathy of despair; moral, and social characteristics of our vie "Oh, well, it is a sad affair, but nothing tims the Chinese people; and then the can be done; these Orientals will get their actual, and very peculiar circumstances of opium somehow; and, moreover, the trade, this vast aggregate of human beings at this with its vast profits, is an absolutely indis- present critical moment. When, as now, pensable item of Indian revenue: it must not be touched. We can only comfort ourselves with the thought that, if we are destroying the millions of China, we are saving the millions of India, with the money." we speak of the people of China as our victims, we do not assume, as if it were already proved, the guiltiness of any who may stand forward as the immediate authors of the wrongs that are inflicted upon them: or we assume only that sort of general blameworthiness which may rest upon all of us, and upon each, if, after being informed of the facts, we fail to do what might be possible to us for rescuing the sufferers from their This is what one hears; but neither the statement of the case, nor the inference thence derived, has a good sound-we distaste both; and more than this, we have convinced ourselves, by means of a careful examination of the evidence, first, that the miserable fate. facts are not as is here supposed; and secondly, that they do not sustain any such conclusion as has been hastily drawn from them. With all possible brevity and simplicity we shall convey to the reader the result of our inquiries, as well as the grounds of the inference which we think they warrantably support. No good purpose, just now, would be secured by our endeavouring to weigh one mass of human misery against another mass, so as to be able to affirm that the ruin and the woe attendant upon the trade in opium is as great as that which has made the African slave trade an object of execration to all nations. Whether it be a greater evil or a less, the traffic now in view is burdened with a weight which cannot be duly estimated; and the contemplation of which should press as an intolerable load upon the minds The vast plains of China are occupied by mingled races, aboriginal and immigrative, distinguished very broadly by their physical and moral characteristics, with which, however, we are not just now concerned. We restrict ourselves again by speaking of the genuine Chinese, not of the Tartar. What the man of China may have been in remote ages, and what he has done, we do not authentically know, and we need not now inquire. Such as we find him at this time, he is our equal in many of the arts of life;-in some of these arts he is our master, and has long been our superior:-he possesses every needful aptitude for general business, and for the ordering and administering of those interests which bear upon social, municipal, and political order. He is astute, apprehensive, and intelligent; but he wants the philosophic, or the intellectually abstractive tendency, even if he be not altogether defi- its purpose to any appreciable extent: it cient in the inherent faculty. He is the has so failed because its officials, the men in practical man; and thus far he has the Eu- its employ, are, almost without an exception, ropean characteristic, more than the Asiatic. venal: they fulfil their trust when they are But there is a want in his constitution which not tempted to betray it; but they betray allies him more nearly to the Asiatic than it as often as they are offered a bribe. An to the European families. He is alive to administration, outstretched as it is over so the moral sentiments- the domestic emi-vast an area, even if at the centre there were nently; but these sentiments in him are ra- seated the highest energy and wisdom, ther the immemorial form of the national could scarcely carry out its purposes for the mind, than the form and the personal pro- wellbeing of the people-the people being perty of the individual man:—the moral such as they are even if public opinion, sentiments are the colour and the mould of well directed, were universally diffused, and a soft mass, that of the universal Chinese were instantaneous in its appliance, and soul:-they escape our grasp when, on this were at its command. How then should it side of human nature, we are endeavouring realize any such purposes, wholly destitute to get a firm hold of the individual man. In as it is of these auxiliary means? On this the Chinese individual man the moral senti- ground again, therefore, and every way, the ment does not fill its due place as the solid Chinese people are our victims;-the peonucleus of the character;-it slips away ple, by their inherent moral laxity;-the when one would seize it;-the man is infirm nation, by the powerlessness of the Governin purpose; he is loosely regardful of ment; for when it would do good, evil, only truth; he is vaguely alive to responsibili- evil, is present with it, in its agents. As a ties, if they be at all remote in their issues. Government, even if it have some vitality Slightly, therefore, and superficially, and in itself, it has to do only with a putrefying ritually only, is he a religious man. As carcase. And so it is that, if for our own the sensuous and animal elements are fully vicious purposes we are seeking to make a developed in him, and the relish of momen- prey of hundreds of millions of people, we tary pleasure is very keen, he is the crea- have, in the people of China, a victim quite ture of immediate impulses-he is the vic-ready to our hand. tim almost always of temptation. In every But this is not the whole of the case with community, it is true, that those who have which we have just now to do. A victim is acquired the fatal habitude of indulgence, at our mercy-and at this moment this vicare, as we here say, the ready victims of tim is torn, spoiled, and bleeding. The temptation; and so are the infirm by consti- means of information which are within reach tution; but these are exceptive cases in a of Europeans, concerning the present insurmoralized community. In China the excep- rectionary movement in China, are too slentions are very few with whom reason, prù-der and dubious to afford ground even for a dence, or moral consistency hold sway, giv- statement of the actual facts which might be ing to the individual man a consciousness of relied upon; much less for forming any an power, and a degree of self-respect:-the ticipation of the probable issue of this wideChinese people, if they are to be thought of ly-spread civil war. Thus far, however, as occupying a place among civilized nations, there can be no room for doubt: the impeare, in mass, the prompt victims of every rial government is hard pressed upon, and sensuous momentary indulgence. They are is in a state of the utmost alarm, as to its the very people, to coerce or to seduce very existence. What term should be apwhom should seem a wrong of the deepest plied to its assailants is not clear: are they atrocity. rebels?-are they the rightful claimants of That very same infirmity of the moral a position from which they have been ejectnature, whether it be the primeval character-ed?—are they reformers, regenerators, and istic of the race, or the consequence of ages the armed propagators of a better religious of religious darkness, exposes them in an- belief, and a better morality, and a more other way to every ill influence. The Impe- liberal polity? Toward which side should rial Government has, on many occasions, the sympathies and wishes of the European and especially in relation to the opium- nations go over? If aid were afforded to plague, shown an anxiety unquestionably sin- either party to which party should it be cere, to protect the people from what it has given? We imagine that to not one of known to be working their ruin. It has these questions can a satisfactory answer be enacted laws-it has submitted to very given at this moment; and it may be long costly compromises of its fiscal interests-it before we-that is, Europeans, can come to has inflicted the severest punishments upon know the state of facts, or the rights of the its agents; yet it has always failed to effect conflict. Meanwhile these things are out of question-that, in a country so extensive as | wretchedness, so again it is this very wretchChina, so thickly peopled, so sadly wanting edness which leads to, and which promotes in moral energies and public virtue, and so drunkenness. The two destructive forces much accustomed to spectacles of sanguinary are always adding intensity, each to the atrocity, a civil war or a war of any kind, other. In China, at this time we are speakwhen once it has got ahead, will be of long ing especially of those districts in which the continuance-will draw in its course all insurrection is raging-so long as the miseraconceivable and inconceivable miseries- ble people, driven from their industrial slaughters, pestilences, famines, and these, courses, can find yet another silver coin, they and each of them, on a scale vastly outmea- will carry it, in utter despair, to the smoksuring the proportions of similar devasta- ing shop, that they may there lose, for a tions taking place in a European kingdom. season, the consciousness of their load of Such being the facts-and it being also woe. This is a course of things-it is an certain that an armed interference on the interaction of cause and effect, which must part either of Great Britain or 'America, go on with rapid acceleration, until the last which are the two potent spectators of the stage of social dissolution shall have been conflict, would be far more likely to aggra- reached by the mass of the people. vate the mischief, than to bring it to an end A principal element in the gloomy sub-nothing remains for us, and for all who ject which we have now in view is the recentprofess the common sympathies of humanity, ness, comparatively, of the evil. If the fact and who call themselves Christians-nothing were this, that the use of opium as an intoxbut to stand aloof, not indeed with indiffer-icating drug had been an immemorial ence, but with feeling-careful, on our own practice, under the influence of which the part, of taking any course through heedless- people of China had, from the remotest ness, through arrogance, or from nefarious times, some way, contrived to float forward motives, the effect of which should be to render still more intense the sufferings of the people; or to put a cruel advantage into the hands of the one party, which will not fail to be used and abused by it, without compunction, against the other. such as they have always been, and in the main, as well to do as other imperfectly civilized races, we might think that the mischiefs attending it, whatever they may be, do meet their corrective in some unknown manner; and, at any rate, that an ancient and inveFrom the statements which we have yet terate practice, however bad it may be, is to make, it will appear, beyond question, quite beyond our control; and that it must that the fast-spreading ruin of the Chinese be thought of only as one among the many people, consequent upon their infatuated sources of evil which afflict humanity at taste for opium, brings peculiar aggrava- large. But such is far from being the fact. tions with it, at this present time, when in- It may not be possible to trace, to its actual ternal war, with its violences and confusions, rise, the practice in question, as an ordinary are threatening to break down all those re- usage of Chinese life-say, among the wealthy straints of social order, which, through so and luxurious; but it is quite certain that, many ages, have secured to the people of as a usage affecting extensively the masses China a large measure of material wellbeing. of the people, it is quite recent; and equally The evils which are likely, for a long time certain that its spread among the millions is to come, to afflict the empire, are of a kind going on at so rapid a rate of increase that that must aggravate each other-as thus ;-each year shows an enormous excess in the that enervation-mind and body, of the consumption of the drug, over that of the pre male population which opium-smoking is ceding year. The evil, as a source of national rapidly producing, rendering millions of the people the men-incapable either of selfdefence, or of any prudential course of action for the preservation of order, invites the violence and rapacity of that portion of the people which is learning to live by brigand- It appears, and the evidence is of the most age. Thus, on the other hand, the miseries, authentic kind, that whereas previously to the destitution, and the many forms of suffer- the year 1767, the export of opium from ing which attend civil war, have the direct India to China had not usually exceeded 200 tendency (so it is with all modes of intoxica- chests annually-the time when a new imtion) to drive men to seek that fatal tempo- pulse was given to the trade by the Company rary oblivion and excitement which opium-it has, from that time to this, gone on inso readily affords. All the world over-and creasing, with variations, from year to year, we may see it in every street of our crowded until the present time (or a time dated three towns as it is drunkenness which produces years back) when not less than fifty or sixty misery, is comparatively new; and it is swelling every moment as a flood; and it is now in full course to cover the surface of this vast region, from a seaboard of a thousand miles, and inward, a thousand miles deep. |