The night side of opium-eating and smoking must be seen, as well as the bright and sunny day, before we lavish upon it encomiums, such as some of its votaries have indulged in. There may be a paradise to which the Theriaki can rise, but there is also an abyss into which he may fall. Lord MacCartney informs us that the Javanese, under an extraordinary dose of opium, become frantic as well as desperate. They acquire an artificial courage; and when suffering from misfortune and disappointment, not only stab the objects of their hate, but sally forth to attack in like manner every person they meet, till self-preservation renders it necessary to destroy them. As they run they shout _Amok, amok_, which means _kill, kill!_ and hence the phrase _running a muck_. The practice of running amok is hardly known at Pinang or any of the three Straits settlements. Captain Low did not recollect more than two instances at that place, including Province Wellesley, within a period of seventeen years, and the last he had heard of, which took place on shore at Singapore, was many years ago. A man ran _amok_—or, as the Malays term it, _meng amok_. He had gambled deeply, it was said, and had killed one or more individuals of his family. He next dosed himself with opium and rushed through the streets with a drawn kris or dagger in his hand, and pursued by the police. Major Farquhar, the then resident, hearing the uproar, went out of his house, where the infuriated man, who was just about to pass it, dashed at him, and wounded him in the shoulder; but a sepoy, who was standing as sentry at the door, received the desperado on his bayonet at the same instant, and prevented a second blow. Captain Beeckman was told of a Javanese who ran a muck in the streets of Batavia, and had killed several people, when he was met by a soldier, who ran him through with his pike. But such was the desperation of the infuriated man, that he pressed himself forward on the pike, until he got near enough to stab his adversary with a dagger, when both expired together.