Opium made the British vast sums of money. Indian opium became a global commodity in the nineteenth century, spreading everywhere from San Francisco to Europe and, especially, across China. The opium plant produces drugs such as morphine and codeine and, of course, heroin. It can also be smoked in its raw form. Opium found its way into medicines that treated everything from pain following surgery to infant’s teething. In China, opium use spread terrifically across the 1800s, creating an epidemic of addiction and playing a central role in the so-called “opening” of the country to Western imperialism.