52 TEA 



The plants become well established and ready lor 

 picking when three years old, at which time they are 

 sending out abundance of young leaf-shoots, known as 

 the " flush." From this time onwards the picking or 

 plucking is carried out at regular intervals, and, to induce 

 the formation of abundant flushes, tin- bushes are 

 pruned from time to time, a process which also keeps 

 the growth of the plant within bounds to allow of the 

 plucking bring conveniently performed. In the colder 

 climates of China and Japan, the flushing ceases in the 

 winter ; but in Ceylon it goes on all the year round. 



In Ceylon the Hush is ready for picking every ten or 

 twelve days. The process consists in plucking the 

 young shoots, to include the third or fourth leal from 

 the hud, and upon the si/e of the leaf depends the quality 

 of the tea manufacture. Thus, plucking is designated 

 as " fine " when the bud at the top of the shoot and the 

 two young leaves just below it are taken, " medium " 

 when the bud and three 1 , " coarse " when the bud and 

 four leaves are taken. From the " line " plucking the 

 tea known as "pekoes" are made, "flowery pekoe" 

 being derived from the youngest leaf. " orange p -koe " 

 from the next youngest, and " pekoe " from the third 

 leaf ; " souchongs " and " congous " are prepared from 

 the larger leaves. Pekoe-souchong, as the name indi- 

 cates, is intermediate in quality between pekoe and 

 souchong. 



The Hush is gathered by the women into baskets and 

 when the latter are full they are taken to the factory 

 to be weighed. The leaf is carried to the upper floor 

 of the factory, where it is thinly spread out on light 

 open-work shelves of canvas, or on wire-meshed trays 

 placed one above the other, in order that tl>o drying or 

 " withering " of the leaf may take place-. In good 

 weather the correct degree of flaccidity is reached in 



