A chest of opium, which cost eight hundred dollars, is said to quadruple in price, when prepared for use. Opium is vended as openly as teas, by the foreign merchants; the quantity disposed of, and on hand, and the average price, are printed and published monthly, and are in the possession of every dealer; and the chits, or orders given on the commanders of the ships, are generally sold like scrip, to a great number of persons on speculation, before the delivery is finally completed. [Sidenote: OPIUM-SMOKERS.] The tremendous and horrible effects upon the personal appearance of its votaries, may be seen daily, about the suburbs of Canton, and of all the pitiable objects the eye ever saw, a confirmed opium-smoker is apparently the most degraded and worthless. When he has once passed the Rubicon, reformation seems to be impossible, the sting of death which is sin, has seized upon him, his feet are already within the precincts of the grave, and he has sunk like Lucifer, “never to rise again.” When the effect has subsided, an emaciated, nerveless wretch is seen, with a cadaverous skin, eyeballs wildly protruding from their sockets, the step faltering, the voice weak and feeble, and the countenance idiotic; but when an opium-smoker lies under the baneful influence of the narcotic, the images which flit before his diseased imagination, are exquisite, brilliant, heavenly: it is the Nepenthé, prepared by the hands of the fair Helen, which so exhilarated the spirits of all who had the happiness to partake of it, that all care was banished for the time being, from their benighted recollections. [Sidenote: MANTCHOU DYNASTY.]