TEA. VINE. 



131 



93. Most botanists place in this 

 family the tea-plant (fig. 158) 

 Camellia (from Camellus or 

 Kamel, the name of a Jesuit bota- 

 nist). This remarkable genus fur- 

 nishes the domestic tea in universal 

 use, and flowering trees and shrubs 

 which are universally admired. 

 There are two species, the Camel- 

 lia bohe'a, and the Camel' Ha viri- 

 dis, which furnish tea. This article 

 is prepared with great care, and 

 considerable labour. The leaves 

 are carefully picked one by one ; 

 dried in shallow, iron pans, over a 

 slow fire ; exposed to the air, fre- 

 quently turned, and finally passed 

 through a winnowing machine, such 

 as is commonly used by our farmers 

 for wheat, &c. In this way the 

 kinds of tea are separated, the 

 lightest falling farthest from " the 

 fan ;" the first and the heaviest is 

 the " imperial," next the young 

 hyson, then gunpowder, and so on. 



Both green and black tea are said to be from the same plant ; 

 but the green tea is longest over the fire. Rusckenberger's 

 Voyage round the World. 



94. The VINI'FEK^E, or VITES, or AMPELLI'DE^E, form 

 another nat-ural family closely resembling the preceding, which 

 belongs to the same class ; it is composed of bushes or sarment- 

 ous (trailing or climbing) shrubs, which support 

 themselves by tendrils growing in the place of the 



peduncles ; with simple or digitate, alter- 

 nate leaves, having two stipules at the 

 base, and small greenish flowers ar- 

 ranged in racemes opposite to the leaves ; 

 calyx very short, and the corolla com- 

 posed of five petals, and five stamens 

 opposite to the petals ; the fruit is a 

 Pi* 159 globular berry containing from one to 

 VINE. ' four seeds. Annexed are representations VINE. 



93. To what family does the tea-plant belong ? What is the genus of the 

 tea-plant ? Where does it grow ? 



94. What are the characters of the family Viniferae? How many species 

 of vine are cultivated in France ? What are raisins ? What are currants ? 



Fig. 158. TEA-PLANT. 



