J9« 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[November i, 1882- 



TEA CULTURE:— A REVIEW. 



{From the North China Herald.) 

 The Tea Cydopedia ; a Volume of Selections from Leading and 

 Oriixinal Articles, Correspondence and Papers regarding matters of 

 permanent interest and value concerning Tea and Tea-science, 

 'rea-bli''hts. Soils and Manures. Tea-cultivation, Buildings and 

 Miuiuiacture. luiscellaueons Tea-topics, Tea-statistics, etc., etc., etc. i 

 Calcutta — office oi the Indian Tea Gazette, 10 Hare St. i 



Though we live in the land of the tea-plant, it is aston- \ 

 ishin" how little the average resident in China knows 

 about it. El en those whose livelihood depends upon the ] 

 once " noble article" are often found to be as ignorant 

 as is any outsider : their knowledge is confined to the 

 assumed value of the leaf on the London or New York 

 markets, and they take httle or no interest in the details 

 of its production ai.d preparation for sale. So great was 

 the want of knowledge displayed by those who would 

 naturally be expected to be the best informed upon the 

 •subject, that until quite recently, and owing solely to the 

 investigations made in India, it was an axiom of general 

 belief that black and green teas were gathered from 

 totally distinct plants. Such enquiries as might have 

 led to more accurate information were beyond the scope 

 nf the merchant dealing in the article, and the best tea- 

 taster was often he who, confining himself to a practical 

 knowledge of its market value, had the least theoretical 

 acquaintance with the conditions ruling its production. 

 And the apathy thus displayed is not couflued to the 

 foreign merchaut. The Chinese themselves with whom 

 he comes in contact, brokers and hongmen, appear equally 

 ignorant, and Uttle information is to be gleaued from 

 them. Unless the ^yestern buyer is prepared to speak 

 the language and to spend a good portion of the season 

 in the interior, watching with his own eyes each stage of 

 production, the result of his stay in the conntry will be no 

 greater, as far as a real acquaintance with his subject is 

 concerned, than if he had never wandered a hundred 

 miles from the dingy purlieus of Jlincing Lane. 



■\\'hile thus, in old times the European tea-merchant 

 in China was content to purchase at the sea-port and ship 

 home whatever the native teamen produced for sale, 

 satisfied to reap an easy profit without asking trouble- 

 some questions ; in the present epoch profits are no longer 

 easy ; the bright pro.spect5 of former decades are clotided 

 over,' and the newspapers, when they allude to the subject, 

 are filled with wailing and lamentation over the hard 

 times on which we have now fallen. Barely twenty 

 years ago a cloud no bigger than a man's hand appeared 

 upon the Western horizon in the sltape of an export from 

 Calcutta of about one million pounds of Assam tea. 

 .one looked upon this indication as a warniug of a 

 coming storm, for it was said Indian tea is bitter and 

 unpalatable, and is a novel experiment not likely to 

 succeed on a large scale or to oust from its supremacy 

 the delicate fragrant growth to which long custom has 

 wedded tea-drinkers all th" world ovrr. Yet the small 

 cloud has increased fifty-fold, and the storm has begun 

 to break with no httle violence, until we find the con- 

 sumption of China tea actually receding and the average 

 value reduced nearly oue-half. The time has now 

 come when all concerned are compelled, willmgly or not, 

 to pay some attention to the rationel of the subject, 

 and endeavour to enable themselves to form a judgment 

 regarding both the present position and the future 

 pro.spects of the trade in which they are engage.l. 



A most serviceable aid to such an mqutry is the file of 

 the Indian Tea Gazette, which in our opmion every 

 person interested in the cultivation or the sale of the 

 article should read -.—if not in the numbers of the 

 journal as they appear monthly in Calcutta, then lu tlie 

 condensed form as given in the work under review, in 

 which is accumulated the cream of eight years issues. 

 This work possesses farther the advantage of having its 

 contents classified according to subjects. I uhke Colouel 

 Money's well-known standard work on tea-cultivation, 

 Hie Indian Tea Gazette is an accumalation of facts bearing 

 on every branch of the subject, contributed by various 

 authors, all specialists, and thus exhibiting the matter 

 from every possible point of view. Controversies are 

 carried on by various correspondents, and the reader is 

 enabled to draw his own conclusions. Every fresh dis- 

 covery or suggestion as to the improvement of the 

 mauufacture or in the methods of carrying on the trade 



are freely given to the public, thus setting an example 

 of cordial interhelp which the merchants in China would 

 do well to emulate instead of as at present (as it would 

 seem from such glimpses of the buying in Hankow as 

 are from time to time vouchsafed to the geni'ral public) 

 throwing dust in each other's eyes. In India it would 

 appear that any specially fortunate planter hastens to 

 publish the secrets of his success. Thus we have here collated 

 the experience of planters scattered over all the various 

 tea growing districts of India from Ohittagong to the 

 Punjaub, and the advantages of different methods argued 

 out, until little doubt as to the best course to pursue 

 in any given case is left. The soil to be chosen, the 

 nianm'ing, the plucking of the flushes, whether at long 

 or short intervals, the withering, firing, packing, ship- 

 ments, and sale, are all related in detail, and lastly the 

 opening up of new markets and the supplanting of China 

 tea wherever practicable is strenuously advocated and 

 the means of success pointed out. The generality of the 

 contributors are curt and to the point as becomes practical 

 men, but a few wild notions seem still to prevail where 

 China tea is the subject of discussion. Tims at page 

 23 we find it stated " that the time is probably not far 

 distant when the tea trade will buy entirely by analysis, 

 supplemented in a few cases by a taster's report. An 

 experienced palate will detect particular flavours which 

 analysis wiU fail to show ; but a fairly complete chemical 

 examination of tea is of the highest value, whether as 

 a guide to the purchaser, or merely to shew its freedom 

 from adulteration." As well might we resort to chemical 

 analysis to enable us to gauge the bouquet of Burgundy 

 and hence its value. At the same time the long list of 

 methods for discovering adulteration are useful, and the 

 scientific account of the growth and development of the 

 XjLaut interesting in the extreme to the tea-drinker as well 

 as to the grower or dealer ; but the fact that the flavouring 

 substances of tea and coffee are chemically identical shews 

 the futility of trying to arrive by chemical analysis at the 

 value of an article grown to please the palate. From an 

 analysis given on page 34C we find that in dried tea the 

 element theine comprises about one-tenth of the weight 

 of the whole. The aualy.st also states that theine does not 

 produce wakefulness, but that its effect on the system is 

 a .sedative one. Theine and quinine are' similar in their 

 chemical constituents, and although tea may not cure 

 fever and ague, it doubtless acts as a preventative. The 

 next elements of importance in tea are the volatile oil 

 and the tannic acids. This former element upon which 

 the commercial value mainly depends, and whose quality 

 cau only be gauged by the palate of an expert, forms in 

 the best teas only a fiftieth part of the weight of the 

 whole. To this is due the distinctive flavour, and no chemical 

 analysis of it has yet been made. It is to the presence 

 of this oil that the wakefulness attributed to tea drinking 

 is due, and it is stated by those who have made these 

 subjects a special study that it acts upon the system in 

 the same manner that digitalis — the foxglove — does. 



It is a well-known fact that this sleepnessness and, 

 when tea is taken to excess, palpitation of the heart is 

 more marked in green tea then in black tea-drinkers. 

 This latter knnrffii or " worked " tea as it is technically 

 described, and hnnij-cha or " red " tea as it is popularly 

 known by the Chinese) loses a portion of its volatile oil 

 in the " withering " (or, as it is improperly called " ferment- 

 ation")* which is replaced by an empyreumatic oil developed 

 in the subsequent firing and to wh'ch the peculiar soft 

 flavour of Congou is due. A similar effect is produced in 

 the curing of tobacco ; upon the effectual manner in which 

 this is carried out depends the absence of the biting 

 acrid taste of ill-cured leaf, and its consequent nau.seating 

 elfects even upon the system of the practised smoker. 

 The volatile oil is still there, but its character is changed. 

 Hence the importance, in obtainmg a well-flavoured cup 

 of tea, of employing soft water capable of dissolving the 

 volatile oil, not steeping it too long so as to overpower 

 the flavour with the bitter extract of tannin, nor of 

 boiling the tea, by which the volatile oil is driven oflf and lost. 



* The reviewer has here fallen into a curious mistake. 

 The process of withering, which makes the gathered 

 leaves flaccid as finest .satin, precedes the rolling process, 

 after which comes fermentation. — Ed. 



