6 Select Plants for Industrial Culture and 



Hills, according to Kurz. This evergreen and ornamental bush 

 has proved hardy in the lowlands at Melbourne, where in exposed 

 positions it endures quite unharmed light night-frosts as well as 

 the free access of scorching summer-winds. But it is in humid 

 valleys, with rich alluvial soil and access to springs for irrigation, 

 that the most productive tea-fields can be formed. The greater the 

 rainfall in any region, otherwise adapted, the richer the yield of the 

 Tea-plant. The plant comes into plentiful bearing of its product 

 as early as the Vine and earlier than the Olive. Its culture is not 

 difficult, and it is singularly exempt from fungus-diseases, if planted 

 in proper localities. Pruning is effected in the cool season, in order 

 to obtain a large quantity of small tender leaves from young 

 branches. Both the Chinese and Assam tea are produced by 

 varieties of a single species, the tea-shrub being indigenous in the 

 forest-country of Assam also. Declivities are best adapted and 

 usually chosen for tea-culture, particularly for Congou, Pekoe and 

 Souchong, while Bohea is often grown in flat countries. In Japan 

 the tea-cultivation extends to 43 north latitude, where the ther- 

 mometer occasionally sinks to 16 F. [Simmonds], and where in 

 winter-time the ground is frozen several inches deep for weeks 

 [General W. Gr. Le Due]. The Chinese variety has withstood the 

 winter of Washington in sheltered positions without protection 

 [W. Saunders]. The Assam variety succumbs to frosts. For 

 fuller details Fortune's work, " The Tea-Districts of China," might 

 be consulted. The very troublesome Tea-bug of Asia is Helopeltis 

 theivora. Fumigation and the application of bird-lime are among the 

 remedies to cope with this insect. The third volume of the Journal 

 of the Agricultural and Horticultural Society of India is mainly 

 occupied by Lieut. -Colonel Edw. Money's and Mr. Watson's elabo- 

 rate essays on the cultivation and manufacture of tea in India. For 

 more advice on the culture and preparation of tea consult also the 

 writer's printed lecture, delivered in 1875 at the Farmers' Club of 

 Ballarat, further the report of the Commissioner of Agriculture, 

 Washington, 1877, pp. 349-367, with illustrations ; also Bernays's 

 Cultural Industries for Queensland, pp. 181-190. Other works 

 dwell also on tea-culture. The tea of commerce consists of the 

 young leaves, merely heated, curled and sweated. The process of 

 N preparing the leaves can be facilitated by steam-machinery. Already 

 in 1866 three machines for dressing tea were patented in England 

 one by Messrs. Campbell and Burgess, one by Mr. Thomson, and 

 one by Mr. Tayse. To give an idea of the quantity of tea, which is 

 consumed, it may be stated, that from June to September, 1871, 

 were shipped 11,000,000 Ibs. of tea from China alone to Australia, 

 and that the produce of tea in India from January to June of 1872 

 \vas 18,500,000 Ibs. The imports into Britain during 1886 were 

 230,669,292 Ibs, valued at 11,317,418. The import into Victoria 

 alone came in 1887 to 14,120,051 Ibs., valued at 694,898 ; while 

 Assam-tea was obtained in India to nearly ninety million Ibs. 

 during that year, Ceylon uncounted [J. B. White]. In 1840 India 



