2 EARLY HISTOEY 



covery of numerous medicinal plants, and of tea 

 among the rest, to the Emperor Shin Nong *, es- 

 teemed as the inventor of agriculture, and author 

 of physic : — for the Chinese themselves admit 

 their chronology of this period to be defective, 

 and that they have no authentic histories prior 

 to the time of Yao and Shun.f It nevertheless is a 

 common practice among empirics, even at the 

 present day, to ascribe the discovery of their 

 several nostrums to the Emperor Shin Nong, 

 though all such pretension is treated as fabulous ; 

 and, with respect to tea in particular, receives no 

 sanction from the more recent Chinese accounts 

 of the history of that tree. 



The earliest authentic account of tea, if any thing 

 so obscure and vague can be deemed authentic, 

 is contained in the She King, one of the classical 

 works of high antiquity and veneration among the 

 Chinese, and compiled by their renowned philoso- 

 pher and great moralist Confucius. J This work, 

 however, contains no more than the following ob- 

 scure expression which is considered by the Chi- 

 nese commentators as having an allusion to tea — 

 "Who says the Tu is better, it is sweet as the 

 Csy." Now, we learn from other authorities, as 

 well as from the standard dictionary of the 

 country, published with the sanction of the Em- 



* b. c. 3254. 



■f b.c. 2357, see translation of Du Halde, vol. i. page 143, note. 



J Born 550 b. c. 



