234 CHEMICAL, MEDICAL AND DIETICAL PROPERTIES. 



drinker, who for twenty years diluted his meals with an 

 infusion of this fascinating plant, whose kettle had scarcely 

 time to cool, who with tea amused the evening, with tea 

 solaced the night, and with tea welcomed the morning." 

 While Brady, in his well-known metrical version of the 

 psalms, thus illustrates its advantages : 



" Over our tea conversations we employ, 

 Where with delight instructions we enjoy, 

 Quaffing without waste of time or wealth 

 The soverign drink of pleasure and of health" 



Cooper's praise of the beverage has been sadly hack- 

 neyed, nevertheless, as the Laureate of the tea table, his 

 lines are worthy of reproduction here : 



" While the bubbling and loud hissing urn 

 Throws up a steaming column, and the cup 

 That cheers, but not inebriates, wait on each, 

 So let us welcome peaceful evening in." 



That Coleridge, in his younger days, must have liked 

 tea is inferred from the following stanza : 



" Though all unknown to Greek and Roman song, 

 The paler Hyson and the dark Souchong, 

 Which Kieu-lung, imperial poet praised 

 So high that cent, per cent, its price was raised." 



Gray eulogizing it : 



" Through all the room 

 From flowing tea exhales a fragrant fume." 



Byron, in his latter years, became an enthusiast on the 

 use of tea, averring that he " Must have recourse to 

 black Bohea," still later pronouncing Green tea to be 

 the " Chinese nymph of tears." And in addition to the 

 praises sung to it by English-speaking poets and essayists, 

 its virtues have also been sounded by Herricken and 

 Francius in Greek verse, by Pecklin, in Latin epigraphs, 



