INTRODUCTION INTO EUROPE. 17 



of Tea, there is no doubt that our merchants would 

 cease altogether to use Ravino Cini, as they call rhu- 

 barb." Yet no accounts at present accessible establish 

 the date of its first introduction into Europe, and it 

 is also a difficult matter to determine to which of the 

 two nations Portugal or Holland the credit of first 

 introducing it belongs. Some writers claiming that 

 the Dutch East India Company brought Tea to Am- 

 sterdam in 1600, while the Portuguese claim the honor 

 of its first introduction prior to that year. An indis- 

 putable argument in favor of the latter is the notice 

 given of it by Giovani MafFei in his " History of India," 

 published in 1559. " The inhabitants of China, like those 

 of Japan," he writes, "extract from an herb called Chia 

 a beverage which they drink warm, and which is ex- 

 tremely wholesome, being a remedy against phlegm, 

 languor and a promoter of longevity." While Giovani 

 Botero, another Portuguese, in a work published in the 

 same year, states that " the Chinese have an herb from 

 which they press a delicate juice, which they use instead 

 of wine, finding it to be a preservative against these dis- 

 eases which are produced by the use of wine amongst 

 us." Taxiera, also a native of Portugal, states that he 

 saw the dried leaves of Tea at Malacca some years 

 prior to 1600, and the article is also mentioned in one 

 of the earliest privileges accorded to the Portuguese for 

 trading in 1558; yet it was not until nearly a century 

 from the beginning of that trade that we find the first 

 distinct account from a European pen of the use of Tea 

 as a beverage. 



In a " Dissertation upon Tea, by Thomas Short," 

 printed in London, in 1730, the author gives the follow- 

 ing account of its first introduction into Europe : " The 

 Dutch East India Company on their second voyage 



