12 TEA 







DISPARAGEMENT OF CHINA TEA REFUTED 



" The disparaging statements in regard to China 

 tea, which are based on the fact that it is prepared by 

 hand, may, we think, be disregarded, for it is hardly 

 conceivable that any serious contamination can arise, 

 and if it did any disease organisms that survived the 

 process would be destroyed in the tea-pot. It is well 

 known that, apart from boiling, an infusion of tea is 

 antagonistic to the life and development of micro- 

 organisms, and this appears to be specially the case 

 in regard to the typhoid organism. The objection to 

 the manipulation of tea by hand instead of by machi- 

 nery has about the same logic on its side as has the 

 objection to the grape being trodden under foot 

 before the wine is produced. No one gives much 

 thought to this fact when drinking a favourite claret. 

 The fact is that the tendency of a fermentative 

 process is to exclude adventitious impurities, and 

 fermentation is essential to the production of both 

 tea and wine. The argument in favour of China tea 

 on the ground that in general it is far less astringent 

 than is Indian tea rests on a scientific basis, and 

 there we are content to leave the controversy." 



THE TANNIN DIFFICULTY 



" It is idle and impossible for the advocates of 

 Indian tea to deny that their favourite commodity 

 contains and yields when infused a much larger 

 amount of tannin than for the most part do China 

 teas. The latter, in fact, are altogether more delicate 

 in character and certainly more suited to the require- 

 ments of persons with delicate digestive apparatus. 

 If a dyspeptic is permitted to drink tea at all, that 

 tea should be China tea, because, as a rule, it is mueli 



