— 226 — 



vgeetation than any other territory. Différent types of tea niight hâve 

 originated hère, and after their transport natural sélection might hâve 

 „created" Assam and China tea by sifting the fit from the unfit in each 

 country. This is, however, an appeal {o Ignorance — obscarum per obscuriiis! 

 If we want to consider the Ante-Tibetan range as a distribution centre, 

 we may do so, in my opinion, exclusively for the large-leaved fornis, 

 w^hich, in fact, are to be met with on either side of Ihat water-shed, and 

 particularly to the South and West of it. — And no, if this universality of the 

 central niountains were understood in this sensé, that the Chinese could 

 «change" an originally large-leaved plant inlo a small-leaved one at will, 

 and that this change should be inherited, as Wallich and Griffith 

 accepted as a matter of course. There does not exist any scientific proof 

 of such an „inheritance of acquired characters". 



More value should, in my opinion, be attached to the third possibility. 

 The small-leaved forms of the China plant, which occur chiefly in the 

 eastern provinces, may there very possibly hâve arisen independently of 

 the large-leaved variety '), amidst the otlier Camellia's growing in thèse 

 régions, and with which they hâve more habit-likeness than with the 

 westmost tea forms. This independent origin is confirmed by the existence 

 of indigenous large-leaved India tea in Manipur, and of large-leaved China 

 tea in Yun-nan (Henry). The latter has certain Chinese characteristics; 

 and it is very well admissible that in early times several more centres of 

 wild-growing even more typical Chinese tea hâve existed, still farther 

 eastward, which afterwards hâve been brought under cultivation. 



At présent, however, there can be no question about such centres of 

 wild Chinese tea, and so this class of évidence is not available. In 

 fact, ail records of agricultural plants growing wild in a country so 

 ancient and so intensively tilled as China, should be received with 

 suspicion. Tea may be found, to be sur^i, having /7//2 wild, having occasion- 

 ally sprung up. And there is still another reason for suspicion, namely, 

 that in many cases it is not certain that it is tea at ail which is reported 

 to be so. It is often extremely difficult to distinguish the tea plant from 

 its allies when it does not bear flower or fruit, yet it has frequently 

 happened that lay travellers contented themselves with leaves, in some 

 cases probably even with information of natives, and usually this kind of 

 authority is not good for much. Some very instructive instances may be 

 subjoined hère. Firstly, Tichomirow^) reports from China, that the leaves of 

 Eurya japonica Thunbg., because of their strong resemblance to tea (though 

 of course the sexual organs of this Theacea are absolutely différent), are 



sometimes called ,,wild tea" by the Chinese, and accordingly used 



for the adultération of tea. Tea planters in Ceylon often equally mistake 



') This indepeiidency similarly appears from the gênerai flora's. When, indeed, Central 

 China, Yun-nan and Upper Burma are considered together, their mutuai relationship 

 is closer than compared with south-eastern China (Kwang-tung, Hai-nan). — See the 

 important paper of L. Diels 1901. 



2) W. A. TlCHOMlROW 1892, p. 530. 



