CAMELLIA 



ESTABLISHMENT OF INDIAN GARDENS THBA 



First Garden 



i . .l..ml.o, 1900; Schulte im Hofe, Tropcnpflanzer, 1901, ii. 

 :!7 117.) These may, therefore, be viewed as amplifying t a "t 



less botanic. il publications mentioned in the opening paragraph. But 

 tnil td mention ,till two other works, viz : (a) BretHcnneider History 

 n Botanical Discoveries in China a truly stupendous volume which 

 reviews and indeed often quotes very fully most of the scientific mithor.-. v.lio 

 . ritUm on the Chinese Tea Plant. And lastly (6) Prof. J. J. Rein'n 

 ># of Japan, 1889, which gives a delightful sketch of the early history 

 ; ui Icrn development of the industry in that country. 

 Numerous reports were issued by the Government of India, from the 



<te of the appointment of Mr. C. A. Bruce in 1836, as Superintendent 

 their Assam plantations, to the time when they ceased in 1865 to have 

 y direct interest in tea. These made public the discoveries accomplished 

 ' the experience gained. It had been freely announced that when the 

 iuthistrv no longer required the fostering care of Government, it would be 

 handed over to private enterprise. The progress in Assam was such that Retirement of 

 g before Government could resign their Himalayan plantations they indi* from 



retired from Assam. It may be here mentioned that the first the IndU8tr 7- 

 pie of Assam-made tea was sent to England in 1838. From that 

 the progress was rapid. The other day, while examining the 

 erous papers on tea preserved in the India Office, I came across 

 t purports to have been the first fly-leaf of a commercial sale of tea 

 made by Government. It is signed by Mr. Thos. Watkins, Superintendent 

 of the Government Plantations, and endorsed by N. Wallich, M.D., 

 Superintendent H.C. Botanic Gardens. It is dated Jaipur, Upper Assam, First sales, 

 iv h 5, 1841, and headed, " A Novel and Interesting Sale of Assam 

 the First Importation into the Calcutta Market." That circular 

 produced, Journ. Roy. Hort. Soc., 1907, xxxii., 69) announces, in fact, 

 o parcels of tea offered for sale, namely thirty chests manufactured by 

 Singhfo chief Niugroolla, and ninety-five the produce of the Government 

 plantations. It may thus be noted that the Singhfos were actually 

 nufacturing tea in Assam at the very time apparently that Wallich 

 challenged the production of tea as the evidence necessary to convince 

 him that the Assam indigenous plant was the true tea-yielding species. 



First Public Tea Gardens. The Sibsagar (Jaipur) plantations of the Assam 

 Government were sold in 1840 to the Assam Company the first tea Plantations - 

 ,cern, and to this day very much the largest Company in India. It was 

 hing but prosperous during the first 15 years of its existence, and 

 shares fell so low that they could hardly be sold. But about 1852 it 

 ;an to improve, and with that success the tea industry appeared so 

 mising and attractive that speculators eagerly rushed into it. The 

 i.<' overy of the indigenous tea in Sylhet and Cachar gave the impetus 



(for an expansion of the industry into the Surma valley, and in a few years 

 thereafter the whole of the upper portions of the province of Assam (both 

 the Brahmaptura and Surma valleys) might be described as converted into 

 a huge tea plantation. About this time (1853-5) tea-planting was organised 

 " Darjeeiing, and shortly after followed Chittagong, Chota Nagpur and 



Duras. Ultimately tea cultivation spread over every district of India Plantatlona - 

 ere there was the least hope of success, but with a rapidity that was 

 tain to culminate as it did in the great disaster of 1865-7 . It is needless Disaster, 

 dwell on the causes of that disaster, but the reader is referred to Mr. 1866 ~ 7 - 

 (afterwards Sir) John Ware-Edgar's full report. It was, briefly, a natural 

 i nonce of reckless impetuosity, ignorant supervision and positive 

 dishonesty. Fortunes were made by the few who realised that the tide 



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