Tea Leaves Part 1

Tea Leaves.

by Francis Leggett & Co.

PREFATORY

The casual reader in many a nook and corner of this extended land will perhaps ask--"Who are the publishers of this book, and what is their purpose?" We antic.i.p.ate any such enquiry, and reply that Francis H. Leggett & Co. are Importing and Manufacturing Grocers; that our object in publis.h.i.+ng this and other books is to bring ourselves and our goods into closer relations with consumers at a distance from New York; and incidentally, to provide readers with interesting information respecting the food which they eat and drink.

In our search for material to aid in the preparation of this book, we were greatly indebted to Mr. F. N. Barrett, editor of THE AMERICAN GROCER, who generously gave us access to what is probably the most complete and valuable collection of books upon Foods to be found on this continent.

We wish to also to acknowledge the kind response of Messrs. Gow, Wilson and Stanton, of London, to our requests for statistics of the World's Tea Trade, and particularly for information respecting the Teas of Ceylon and India. If our limitations of s.p.a.ce had permitted, we should have materially increased the interest of our little book by additional matter derived from the last named firm.

(Omitted) Our colored Frontispiece is a faithful representation of a Chinese tea plant, showing the flower and the seeds.

TEA LEAVES

"Pray thee, let it serve for table-talk."--Merchant of Venice.

"A cup of tea!" Is there a phrase in our language more eloquently significant of physical and mental refreshment, more expressive of remission of toil and restful relaxation, or so rich in a.s.sociations with the comforts and serenity of home life, and also with unpretentious, informal, social intercourse?

If rank in the scale of importance of any material thing is to be determined by its extensive and continued influence for good, to tea must be conceded a very elevated position among those agencies which have contributed to man's happiness and well- being.

Most remarkable changes have occurred in the production of tea during the past century. About sixty years ago all the tea consumed on the globe was grown in China and j.a.pan. Our knowledge of the growth and manufacture of tea was then of an uncertain and confused character, and no European had ever taken an active part in the production of a pound of tea. To-day, about one-half of the tea consumed in the world is grown and manufactured upon English territory, on plantations owned and superintended by Englishmen, who have thoroughly mastered every detail of the art, while nearly all the tea drank in Great Britain is English grown.

Twenty years ago, the suggestion that tea might yet be grown upon a commercial scale in the United States was received with derision by the Press and its readers; but one tea estate in South Carolina has during the past year grown, manufactured, and sold at a profit, several thousand of the tea of good quality, which brought a price equal to that of foreign fine teas.

A natural taste for hot liquid foods and drinks is common to all races of men, and they may be traced in the soups of meat and fish, and in their decoctions or infusions of vegetable leaves, seeds, barks, etc.

Hot "teas" were in habitual use as beverages among civilized nations long before they ever heard of Chinese tea, of coffee, or of cocoa. The English people, for instance, freely indulged in infusions of Sage leaves, of leaves of the Wild Marjoram, the Sloe, or blackthorn, the currant, the Speedwell, and of Sa.s.safras bark. In America, Sa.s.safras leaves and bark were used for teas by the early colonists, as were the leaves of Gaultheria (Wintergreen), the Ledums (Labrador tea), Monarda (Horsemint, Bee-balm, or Oswego tea), Ceanothus (New Jersey tea or red-root), etc. Charles Lamb, in his essay upon Chimney Sweeps, mentions the public house of Mr. Reed, on Fleet street in London, as a place where Sa.s.safras tea (and Salop) were still served daily to customers in his time, about 1823. Mate, Yerba, or Paraguay tea has been a national beverage for millions of people in the central portions of South America for several centuries.

With the exception of Mate, not one of the above named subst.i.tutes for Chinese tea contains the peculiar nerve stimulating and nerve refres.h.i.+ng const.i.tuent upon which depends the physiological value of Black or Green tea, the Theine: nor do they possess the characteristic flavoring principle or essential oil which distinguishes commercial teas from all other known plant products. The Ledums are indeed accredited by Professor James F. Johnson (Chemistry of Common Life) with stimulating and narcotic properties, but the same may be said of tobacco.

A comforting, stimulating and healthful beverage, which has been in habitual use by the most extensive nation of the globe for more than a thousand years, and which has at length become a necessity as well as a luxury for seven hundred millions of people, or of a majority of the inhabitants of the earth, is certainly worthy of more than the pa.s.sing thought which accompanies its daily use in the form of "cup of tea."

Dougla.s.s Jerriold, writing of tea, some 50 years ago, said:-- "Of the social influence of Tea upon the ma.s.ses of the people in this country, it is not very easy to say too much. It has civilized brutish and turbulent homes, saved the drunkard from his doom, and to many a mother, who else have indeed been most wretched and forlorn, it has given cheerful, peaceful thoughts that have sustained her. Its work among us in England and elsewhere, aye, throughout the civilized world, has been humanizing and good. Its effect upon us all has been socially healthful; peaceful, gentle and hearty."

There is no article of common use about which so little is popularly known, or of which "we know so many things which are not so." The very names of the various kinds of tea which we use are mysteries of meaning to those who have not made special researches into the subject. And the cause of the distinctions in the qualities of different teas, as of black and green, are still matters of uncertainty and controversy among many dealers of teas, as well as among unscientific travelers and some untraveled scientists. The enthusiastic collector of writings upon tea by self qualified experts, will find himself involved in a maze of contradictory a.s.sertions and opinions from which there is no escape save by the exercise of judicial powers, by an independent exercise of his own judgment, in separating truth from error. And unless he is a proficient in physiology and chemistry, he will find himself baffled at last, because several important scientific questions concerning Tea are still unsolved by adequate authority.

Then there are otherwise sane persons who profess to discover in the habitual use of tea by whole nations a cause of national deterioration. We record the fact as one of the curiosities of mental perversity in an age of general intelligence.

How the inestimable qualities which lie latent in the green leaf of the Tea tree or bush were discovered and developed by the Chinese is one of those mysteries which we shall never solve. For it is a remarkable fact that neither the green leaf of the tea plant, nor the tea leaf dried without mans agency, conveys to human senses any hint of the agreeable or valuable qualities for which tea is esteemed, and which have been developed by the art of man. A leaf of any one of the mints, or of the sa.s.safras tree, or of the wintergreen vine, after being bruised in the hand and applied to the nose or the mouth, makes instant impression upon the senses of taste and small, and at once informs us of its distinctive qualities. Not so with the tea leaf; a hundred valueless plants impress those senses more vividly than the leaf which is worth them all. Infuse the green leaf of the Tea plant and the prized properties of "Tea" are still wanting, but in their stead, positively deleterious qualities are said to appear in the infusion. Commercial Tea must be regarded as an artificial production. A certain degree of artificial heat, of manipulation, and induced chemical changes, are the agents which develop the flavor and aroma of the tea leaf. And the nature of man's treatment and manipulation determines in large measure not only the desired flavor, but the distinguis.h.i.+ng character of the tea, its rank as a green, a black, or an "English Breakfast Tea,"

all three of which may be evolved by skilful manipulation from the same tea bush, at the same time.

Much has been said and written in contention upon this latter a.s.sertion, and books may be quoted upon either side of the question, but we make the statement without qualification and upon unquestionable authority.

As Chinese teas became known to the inhabitants of other parts of Asia, and to Europeans, curiosity and commercial interests impelled other races to seek information concerning the origin and treatment of different Chinese teas. The prices obtained by the Chinese from foreigners for teas two and three centuries ago were most exorbitant, and paid the Chinese Government and Chinese merchants an enormous profit. Quite naturally that sagacious nation saw the danger of letting the truth concerning the origin, manufacture and cost of their most precious commodity pa.s.s into the possession of other people, and they strove to prevent foreigners from penetrating to their inland tea gardens, while they plied inquisitive enquirers with fairy tales which were eagerly swallowed. They said that every different kind of tea was the product of a different species of plant, which bore a different name, and that the manufacture was a most intricate process depending upon secrets confined to a very few; that the leaves could safely be plucked only at certain phases of the moon, and at certain hours of the day, and that some delicate varieties of tea leaves were plucked only by young maidens, etc.

They even allowed Europeans to believe that green tea was colored by salts of copper, on copper plates, having doubtless learned that their were European merchants who would not be deterred from vending poisonous foods provided a good fat profit attended the transaction. In short, they practiced some of the dissimulation and tricks of trade to which many merchants were addicted.

To particularize further, and yet generalize at the same time, we will say here that the Tea plant or tree is greatly modified in hardiness, in height, in size of leaf, and in the quality of the leaf for a beverage, by soil, by moisture, tillage, and climate.

Some soils and some climates develop a tea plant decidedly more suitable for a green tea than for a black tea, and vice-versa.

The Formosa Oolong, with its natural flowery fragrance is a product of a peculiar soil, said to be a clay topped with rich humus. a.n.a.lysis would probably disclose peculiarities in that soil not yet found in other tea districts. In removal to other soils and other localities, the Formosa Tea plant loses its most precious characteristic, its sweet flowery aroma and taste. The total product of this tea is but 18,000,000 lbs. per annum, an insignificant quant.i.ty compared with the aggregate crops of Chinese or of Indian tea gardens. If the exceptional characteristics of Formosa Oolong accompanied the plant when removed to other localities, its cultivation would quickly become greatly extended.

What is known or believed concerning the remote history of Tea and of its dissemination among other nations than the Chinese and j.a.panese, has been told so often that its recapitulation becomes tedious to those who are familiar with the story. But this book is intended for the general reader, and for the purpose of collecting and welding together disconnected and floating facts and sc.r.a.ps of tea literature gathered from many sources.

CHAPTER II.

HISTORICAL.

Until a quite recent period botanists believed that the tea plant was a native of China, and that its growth was confined to China and j.a.pan. But it is now definitely known that the tea plant is a native of India, where the wild plant attains a size and perfection which concealed its true character from botanical experts, as well as from ordinary observers, for many years after it had become familiar to them as a native of Indian forests.

How early in the history of the Chinese that people discovered and developed the inestimable qualities of the tea plant is not known. That Chinese scholar, S. Wells Williams, in his Middle Kingdom places the date about 350 A.D. But somewhere between 500 A.D. and 700 A.D. Tea had become a favorite beverage in Chinese families. Some of the written records of that ancient people push the epoch of tea-drinking back as far as 2700 B.C., appealing to ambiguous utterances of Confucius for corroboration. Tea in China had obtained sufficient importance in political economy in 783 or 793 A.D. to become an object of taxation by the Chinese Government.

Gibbon, in his great work, tells us that as early as the sixth century, caravans conveyed the silks and spices and sandal wood of China by land from the Chinese Sea westward to Roman markets on the Mediterranean, a distance of nearly 6,000 miles. But we hear no mention of the introduction of tea into Europe or western Asia until a thousand years later.

According to Mr. John McEwan (International Geog. Congress, Berlin, 1899,) tea soon found its way from China into j.a.pan and Formosa, but was not cultivated in j.a.pan on a commercial scale until the 12th century.

John Sumner, in a Treatise on Tea (Birmingham, 1863), states that the Portuguese claim to have first introduced tea into Europe, about 1557. Disraeli (Curiosities of Literature) offers evidence that tea was unknown in Russian Court circles as late as 1639.

But Russia and Persia seem to have naturalized tea as a beverage about the same time that it became known in England. Little is said about Persian tea-drinking in modern writing upon tea, but the testimony of many travelers bears witness to the national love of tea by Persians.

The Encyclopedia Britannica concedes to the Dutch, the honor of being the first European tea-drinkers, and states that early English supplies of tea were obtained from Dutch sources. It is related by Dr. Thomas Short, (A Dissertation on Tea, London, 1730), that on the second voyage of a s.h.i.+p of the Dutch East India Co. to China, the Dutch offered to trade Sage, as a very precious herb, then unknown to the Chinese, at the rate of three pounds of tea for one pound of Sage. The new demand for sage at one time exhausted the supply, but after a while the Orientals had a surfeit of sage-tea, and concluded that Chinese tea was quite good enough for Chinamen. If the European traders had known the virtue of sage-tea for stimulating the growth of human hair, and had given the Orientals the cue, sage leaves might have retained their high value with the Chinese until now.

In these days, it may be remarked, the Dutch are said to drink as much tea per capita as the Russians, who are as fond of tea as the Chinese.

While both the English and Dutch East India Companies exhibited in England small samples of tea as curiosities of barbarian customs very early in the 17th century, tea did not begin to be used as a beverage in England even by the Royalty until after 1650.

In a number of the weekly Mercurius Politicus (a predecessor of the present London Gazette), dated September 30, 1658, occurs this advertis.e.m.e.nt:

"That excellent and by all pysitians approved China drink called by the Chineans Tcha, by other nations Tay, alias Tee, is sold at the Sultaness Head, a Cophee-house in Sweetings Rents, by the Royal Exchange, London."

This appears to be the earliest recorded and authentic evidence of the use of tea in England.

Macaulay, in a note in his History of England, says that tea became a fas.h.i.+onable drink among Parisians, and went out of fas.h.i.+on, before it was known in London, and refers to the published correspondence of the French physician, Dr. Guy Patin, with Dr. Charles Spon, under dates of March 10 and 22, 1648, for proof of the fact. Macaulay also says that Cardinal Mazarin was a great tea-drinker, and Chancellor Seguier, likewise.

Frankest and shrewdest among men of brains who have given to the world their inmost thoughts, old Samuel Pepys, pauses in the midst of conferences with Kings and Princes to record that "I did send for a cup of tea (a China Drink) of which I had never drank before." This in September 1660. Seven years later he writes in that wonderful Diary--"Home, and there find my wife drinking of tee, a drink which Mr. Pelling, the Potticary, tells her is good for her cold and defluxions." Then goes on to rejoice over the repulse of the Dutch in an attempt upon London.

To coffee and tea are due the establishment of that unique English inst.i.tution, the London Coffee House. Inns, where quests were expected to lodge as well as eat; restaurants, in which men tarried only for a single meal; and Beer and Spirit shops, abounded in London; but the Coffee House ushered in a new era, and actually changed the daily habits of a large majority of representative London citizens. While it is a.s.serted Mr. Jacobs established the first Coffee House in England, at Oxford, it was a native of Smyrna by the name of Pasqua Rosee who first opened a Coffee House in London, in St. Michael's Alley, Cornhill, in 1652. Hot coffee only was here dispensed, during the day and evening.

Coffee Houses soon increased in number and extended over the business districts of London. Business men quickly recognized the value of a beverage which cleared the mental vision while refres.h.i.+ng and stimulating both mind and body, and repaired to the Coffee House at all hours for the joint purpose of drinking coffee and transacting business with their fellows. Coffee-Houses became the Commercial Exchanges of London, and they were also the precursors of modern English Clubs. Men of affairs, Statesmen, literary celebrities, artists, naval and military officers, all repaired to the Coffee Houses to meet each other, to hear and discuss the serious topics and the light gossip of the day.

The introduction of tea gave the coffee-houses another strong hold upon their customers, and chocolate as a beverage soon followed. Among the early dispensors of these harmless hot drinks was Thomas Garway, or as written later, Garraway, whose four- story brick coffee-house on Exchange Alley, first opened in 1659, had been a rallying point for Londoners for 216 years, when it was pulled down to make room for other structures, in 1873.

Garraway left a monument that has outlasted his coffee-house, in the form of a famous tea circular.

Garway's Famous Circular is so often quoted and mutilated that we print it here in full; it has no date, but it is supposed to have been printed in 1660: