THE TEA PLANT 



Marvellous 

 Prosperity. 



Value of 

 the Tea 

 Industry. 



CAMELLIA 



THEA 



Government Expenditure 



would turn. The better situated gardens were purchased for fewer 

 rupees than they had cost pounds sterling to construct. New companies 

 were formed to work these and with the avowed purpose of growing tea 

 for its own merits, as a commercial article, and not for the purpose of 

 selling gardens at a profit. Out of these trying times the industry rose 

 on a firmer foundation, and the subsequent prosperity is one of the marvels 

 of modern commerce. 



It is not known how much money the Government of India actually 

 spent, from first to last, in their efforts to ingraft the tea industry 

 on India, but it would appear that Gordon's missions to China and the 

 expenditure of the Indian Tea Commission came to close on 18,000. If 

 we assume that sum to have represented but one quarter of the total 

 expenditure actually incurred, the result might still in perfect fairness be 

 characterised as one of the most profitable undertakings of the Administra- 

 tion of the Empire of India. There has been organised a new industry 

 the value of which may be judged of from the following circumstances : 

 Tea now occupies half a million acres of land formerly waste, and of this 

 64 per cent, are in the province of Assam : the industry now gives lucrative 

 employment to close on 600,000 persons : the capital invested in it comes 

 to well over 20,000,000 : the first exports (1838) amounted to 488 lb., 

 and in 1904 they stood at 200 million pounds valued at, say, 6,000,000 : 

 still further, it may be claimed that, as an offshoot of the Indian industry. 

 Ceylon has been saved from absolute bankruptcy by the substitution of 

 tea for coffee : and lastly that India and Ceylon have given to England 

 a regular supply of a much purer and infinitely cheaper article than it 

 formerly received from China (see p. 240). 



CULTIVATION OF TEA. 



(Contributed by HAROLD H. MANN, D.Sc., Scientific Officer to the Indian 

 Tea Association, pp. 218-39). 



Object. The object to be attained in tea-planting is the production 

 on the tea plants of a constant succession of young shoots throughout 

 the season. The youngest leaves on each shoot only are capable of being 

 made into tea, and hence it is easy to see that the growth of tea occupies 

 a unique position among agricultural industries. Few of these concern 

 themselves, except indirectly, in the production of leaf : still fewer limit 

 the crop on a perennial plant to the youngest shoots. To obtain the results 

 needed, the methods applied have a very special character, which has 

 made tea-planting one of the most technical of those industries which 

 depend on the culture of the land. 



Past Failures. The first years of tea-planting in India were, for 

 the reason just indicated, almost a hopeless failure. A very small crop 

 was obtained, the leaf was plucked when too old, and a large part of the 

 tea was hence all but unsaleable, and the early planters had to buy very 

 dearly the experience which has made the tea industry such a great and 

 profitable speculation. In Assam, till 1848, continual losses occurred ; 

 from that time for the next four or five years the Assam Company, the 

 pioneer and only company in the province, just succeeded in paying its 

 way ; thereafter, tea culture became exceedingly profitable, and if checks 

 were received, such as the memorable panic of 1866, it was not owing 

 to the character of tea culture, but rather to financial dealings in Calcutta 

 and in England, coupled with certain fraudulent operations on the spot. 

 Though tea culture has been a profitable industry since 1853, yet the 



218 



Cultiva- 

 tion. 



Features of 

 Planting. 



Past 

 Failures. 



