t my noble friend, in May 1838, to have sent out a
despatch commanding and empowering Captain Elliot to put down the opium
trade? I do not think that it would have been right or wise to send
out such a despatch. Consider, Sir, with what powers it would have been
necessary to arm the Superintendent. He must have been authorised to
arrest, to confine, to send across the sea any British subject whom he
might believe to have been concerned in introducing opium into China. I
do not deny that, under the Act of Parliament, the Government might have
invested him with this dictatorship. But I do say that the Government
ought not lightly to invest any man with such a dictatorship, and, that
if, in consequence of directions sent out by the Government, numerous
subjects of Her Majesty had been taken into custody and shipped off to
Bengal or to England without being permitted to wind up their affairs,
this House would in all probability have called the Ministers to a
strict account. Nor do I believe that by sending such directions the
Government would have averted the rupture which has taken place. I will
go further. I believe that, if such directions had been sent, we should
now have been, as we are, at war with China; and that we should have
been at war in circumstances singularly dishonourable and disastrous.

For, Sir, suppose that the Superintendent had been authorised and
commanded by the Government to put forth an order prohibiting British
subjects from trading in opium; suppose that he had put forth such an
order; how was he to enforce it? The right honourable Baronet has had
too much experience of public affairs to imagine that a lucrative trade
will be suppressed by a sheet of paper and a seal. In England we have a
preventive service which costs us half a million a year. We employ more
than fifty cruisers to guard our coasts. We have six thousand effective
men whose business is to intercept smugglers. And yet everybody knows
that every article which is much desired, which is easily concealed, and
which is heavily taxed, is smuggled into our island to a great extent.
The quantity of brandy which comes in without paying duty is known to
be not less than six hundred thousand gallons a year. Some people think
that the quantity of tobacco which is imported clandestinely is as great
as the quantity which goes through the custom-houses. Be this as it may,
there is no doubt that the illicit importation is enormous. It has been
prov