NEW WREATHS FOR HEROES.
" THE sale of opium is such," so run the last accounts from China, "and the price so remunerating, that it has been proposed to station vessels in different places to serve as depOts for the cargoes. The profits are such as will enable the Honourable Company to defray at least one-half of the expenses of the expedition to China." So it is now avowedly, undisguisedly, an OPIUM Wan. It is a war waged not merely to obtain repayment for the opium destroyed, but to beat down and disperse the Chinese customhouse-officers who oppose its entrance into their country. The Honourable Company is calculating how far its sale of opium alone will go to cover the expenses of their "fair trade." The Honourable Com- pany has become the Dirk Hatteraick of the far East. Great ingenuity has been displayed of late years in the invention of medals, crosses, and other rewards of victorious warriors : the appropriate decoration of the heroes of the OPIUM WAR is at once suggested by the cause they fight for : (or the trade they drive ?) crown them with wreaths of poppies.
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