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prunkard’s grave. The cost of opium is so great that but few of the very poor class can afford to use it. The Chinese authorities have used every effort to stop its sale, but the British government, to afford a market for the opium of India, has forced the accursed drug upon the Chinese at the cannon’s mouth. The Emperor of China, when asked to license its sale, replied in words that should mantle the cheek of every Englishman with shame, “It is true,” said he, “that 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 revenue for the vice and misery of my people.” So Christian England deals with heathen China!
On Monday, 14th of November, we passed the 180th meridian from Greenwich, and were just half round the world from London. At this time my watch—set in Cleveland—was eight hours too fast, and when the dinner gong rounded at five o’clock, it was one o’clock at night in Cleveland and five a. m. in England. It makes one feel that he is indeed far away when his noon lunch or “tiffin” comes at the moment when his friends are seated round the evening lamp in that quiet room at home to which his mind so fondly turns. But to us the day following Monday, the 14th, was Wednesday, 16th of November. Tuesday, the 15th was an unknown day— dropped in the bosom of the Pacific ocean. This will make our calendar agree with that of China and the East Indias, who have taken theirs from the Europeans coming eastward round the world. We are now eleven hours ahead of London and fifteen ahead of Cleveland. In a few days we shall eat our five o’clock Thanksgiving dinner long before daylight on the lake shore, and my Christmas at Shanghai will be thirteen and a half hours ahead of Cleveland. The day lost is past recovery to us who go on round the world, but it will be picked up by the steamer on her return, and if she should pass the 180th meridian on Sunday, the 23th of December, her passengers will have two Sundays in that week and a duplicate Christmas for 1870.
I can only wish them as pleasant weather and as agreeable a ship’s company as we have been favored with. On Thursday we expect to sight Fusiyama, the “happy[errata 1] mountain” of Japan, whose volcanic peak, rising 14,000 feet above the sea will be the first object to meet our gaze in Asia.
- ↑ Correction: happy should be amended to matchless
