COFFEE 



COFFEE. 



it encountered much opposition on the part of ' 

 the Turkish government, and became the occa- 

 sion of public assemblies. Under the reign 

 of Amurath III. the mufti procured a law to 

 shut all the coffee-houses, and this act of sup- 

 pression was renewed under the minority of 

 Mahomet IV. It was not till 1554, under Soly- 

 man the Great, that the drinking of coffee was 

 accredited in Constantinople ; and a century 

 elapsed before it was known in London and 

 Paris. Solyman Aga introduced its use into 

 the latter city in 1669, and in 1672 an Armenian 

 established the first cafe at the fair of St. Ger- 

 main. 



The use of coffee became general among 

 the English sooner than it did with the French. 

 The first mention of coffee on the English sta- 

 tute books is in 1660, when a duty of 4d. is laid 

 upon every gallon of coffee bought or sold. 

 Ray informs us that in 1688 London might 

 rival Cairo in the number of coffee-houses. 



When coffee became somewhat of a neces- 

 sary of life, from the influence of habit among 

 the people, all the European powers who had 

 colonies between the topics, projected to form 

 plantations of coffee trees'in them. The Dutch 

 were the first who transported the coffee plant 

 from Moka to Batavia, and from Batavia to 

 Amsterdam. In 1714, the magistrates of that 

 city sent a root to Louis XIV., which he caused 

 to be planted in the Jardin du Roi. This be- 

 came the parent stock of all the French coffee 

 plantations in Martinique. 



The most extensive culture of coffee is still 

 in Arabia Felix, and principally in the king- 

 dom of Yemen, towards the cantons of Aden 

 and Moka. Although these countries are very 

 hot in the plains, they possess mountains where 

 the air is mild. The coffee is generally grown 

 naif way up on their slopes. When cultivated 

 on the lower grounds, it is always surrounded 

 by large trees, which shelter it from the torrid 

 sun, and prevent its fruit from withering be- 

 fore their maturity. The harvest is gathered 

 at three periods; the most considerable occurs 

 in May, when the reapers begin by spreading 

 cloths under the trees, then shaking the 

 branches strongly, so as to make the fruit drop, 

 which they collect, and expose upon mats to 

 dry. They then pass over the dried berries 

 a very heavy roller, to break the envelopes, 

 which are afterwards winnowed away with a 

 fan. The interior bean is again dried before 

 oeing laid up in store. 



In Demarara, Berbice, and some of the Eng- 

 lish West India islands, where much good coffee 

 is now raised, a different mode of treating the 

 pulpy fruit and curing the beans is adopted. 

 Bee Ire'* Dirt, of the Arts, &c. 



The most highly esteemed coffee is that of 

 Moka. It has a smaller and a rounder bean ; 

 a more agreeable taste and smell than any 

 other. Its colour is yellow. Next to it in 

 European reputation are the Martinique and 

 Bourbon coffees : the former is larger than the 

 Arabian, and more oblong; it is rounded at the 

 >.nds; its colour is greenish, and it preserves 

 almost always a silver gray pellicle, which 

 comes off in the roasting. The Bourbon coffee 

 approaches nearest to the Moka, from which 

 344 



it originally sprung. The Saint Domingo 

 coffee has its two extremities pointed, and is 

 much less esteemed than the preceding. 



The coffee tree flourishes in hilly districts, 

 where its root can be kept dry, while its leaves 

 are refreshed with frequent showers. Rocky 

 ground, with rich decomposed mould in the 

 fissures, agrees best with it. Though it would 

 grow, as we have said, to the height of fifteen 

 or twenty feet, yet it is usually kept down by 

 pruning to that of five feet, for increasing the 

 production of the fruit, as well as for the con 

 venience of cropping. It begins to yield fruit 

 the third year, but is not in full bearing till the 

 fifth, does not thrive beyond the twenty-fifth, 

 and is useless in general at the thirtieth. In 

 the coffee husbandry, the plants should be 

 placed eight feet apart, as the trees throw out 

 extensive horizontal branches, and in holes tea 

 or twelve feet deep, to secure a constant supply 

 of moisture. 



Coffee has been analyzed by a great many 

 chemists, with considerable diversity of re- 

 sults. The best analysis perhaps is that of 

 Schrader. He found that the raw beans dis- 

 tilled with water in a retort communicated to 

 it their flavour and rendered it turbid, whence 

 they seem to contain some volatile oil. On 

 reboiling the beans, filtering and evaporating 

 the liquor to a syrup, adding a little alcohol 

 till no more matter was precipitated, and then 

 evaporating to dryness, he obtained 17-58 per 

 cent, of a yellowish-brown transparent extract, 

 which constitutes the characteristic part of 

 coffee, though it is not in that state the pure 

 proximate principle called cafeine. Its most 

 remarkable reaction is its producing, with both 

 the protoxyde and the peroxyde salts of iron, a 

 fine grass-green colour, while a dark-green 

 precipitate falls, which redissolves when an 

 acid is poured into the liquor. It produces on 

 the solution of the salts of copper scarcely any 

 effect, till an alkali be added, when a very 

 beautiful green colour is produced, which may 

 be employed in painting. Coffee beans con- 

 tain also a resin, and a fatty substance some- 

 what like suet. According to Robiquet, ether 

 extracts from coffee beans nearly ten per cent, 

 of resin and fat, but he probably exaggerates 

 the amount. The peculiar substance cafeine 

 contained in the above extract is crystallizable, 

 It is remarkable in regard to composition, that 

 after urea and the uric acid, and theobromin 

 from chocolate, it is among organic products 

 the richest in azote. It was discovered and de- 

 scribed in 1820 by Runge. It does not possess 

 alkaline properties. Pfaff obtained only ninety 

 grains of cafeine from six pounds of coffee 

 beans. There is also an acid in raw coffee, to 

 which the name of cafeic acid has been given. 

 When distilled to dryness and decomposed, 

 it has the smell of roasted coffee. 



Coffee undergoes important changes in the 

 process of roasting. When it is roasted to a 

 yellowish-brown, it loses, according to Cadet, 

 12 per cent, of its weight, and is in this state 

 difficult to grind. When roasted to a chestnut 

 brown, it loses 18 per cent, and when it be- 

 comes entirely black, though not at all carbo- 

 nized, it has lost 23 per cent.. Schrader has 



