TEA PRODUCING COUNTRIES. 189 



TEA PLANTING IN AMERICA. 



Successful experiments have been made in this branch of 

 cultivation in the United States, as is shown by a report just published 

 by Mr. Jackson, a Scotch gentleman now settled in America, who was 

 at one time manager of the estates of the Scottish Assam Company. 

 The Commissioner of Agriculture has, at Mr. Jackson's advice, selected 

 a tract of land in Georgia for an experimental farm, on which the 

 raising of Tea on an extended scale will be carefully and thoroughly 

 tried. Samples of the Teas already produced by Mr. Jackson have 

 been sent to Messrs. Thompson, tea merchants, Mincing Lane, London, 

 to be examined. The reply was that " They represented Teas of a 

 high type. The flavour, though not strong, is remarkably fragrant. 

 In appearance they resemble Indian Tea, but the flavour is more like 

 that of the finest Chinese black Tea, or of the hill Teas of India." 



No reason why the Teas should not be good, but the 

 labour difficulty will, I think, prevent Tea paying there, 

 as elsewhere in America, for Mr. Jackson himself, who 

 continues the above, asks further on, " Can we afford to pay 

 our labourers four times as much as they pay in India and 

 still make Tea a success ? " He, strange to say, tries to 

 prove " yes." I say no, a thousand times no, in spite of all 

 Mr. Jackson says. I like, however, to give both sides 

 of a question, and so will let Mr. Jackson speak for 

 himself: 



The stock cry continually raised against Tea culture in this country 

 is, how can you raise Tea in a country where wages are so high ? You 

 can cultivate Tea at a profit only in a country where labour is at the 

 lowest possible minimum, and so on. And so it is taken for granted 

 that the Tea culture is to be allowed to retain its antiquated forms 

 and systems for all time, and that the skill and intelligence of a 

 civilized nation can do nothing to raise it to a level with corresponding 

 branches of agriculture, such, for instance, as rice growing. What 

 would the people of South Carolina say if told that the only way to 

 cultivate rice at a profit was to sow all their seed in nursery beds and, 

 when sprouted, to transplant their entire crop, seed by seed, by hand, 



