VARIETIES OF THE TEA PLANT. 51 



The Himalayan gardens consist entirely of Chinese plants 

 mixed occasionally with a low class of hybrid. They were 

 all formed from the Government Nurseries where nothing 

 but Chinese was reared. Occasional importations of Assam 

 and Cachar seed will account for the sprinkling of low class 

 hybrids which may be found. The same may be said of 

 Dehra Dhoon and Kangra. In some gardens in the Terai 

 below Darjeeling a high class of plant exists. In Assam, 

 Cachar, and Chittagong the plantations vary much, but all 

 have some indigenous and high class hybrids, while many 

 gardens are composed of nothing else. 



It is evident, then, that the value of a garden depends 

 much on the class of its plants, and that a wise man will 

 only propagate the best. Only the seed from good varieties 

 should be selected, and gradually all inferior bushes should 

 be rooted out and a good kind substituted. When this shall 

 have been systematically done for a few years on a good 

 garden, which has other advantages, the yield per acre will 

 far exceed anything yet realised or even thought of. 



Government action in the matter of Tea has been pre- 

 judicial in many ways, but in none more so than when they 

 were doing their best to foster the cultivation by distributing 

 Chinese seed and seedlings gratis. No one can blame here 

 (would the Government were equally free from blame in all 

 Tea matters !), but the mischief is none the less. It will 

 never be possible to undo the harm then done. 



The seed of indigenous, hybrid, and Chinese is like in 

 appearance, and cannot be distinguished. Thus, when seed 

 formerly was got from a distance, the purchaser was at the 

 mercy of the vendor. 



High cultivation improves the class of a Tea plant. Thus, 

 a purely China bush, if highly cultivated and well manured, 

 will in two or three years assume a hybrid character. High 

 cultivation will therefore improve the class of all the plants 



