OH^VI^^:^!^ III. 



y^HIS now important and valuable article of food was 

 I y\ known to the early inhabitants of Ethiopia, where 

 its virtues were first discovered and used, as Bim, 

 signifying " brown " or " roasted." In Arabia it is termed 

 Kawah, meaning '' strength " or " vigor," the infusion 

 being called Quahouch; while to the Turks it is known as 

 Chaube in the bean, and Kahve in the liquid state; to Per- 

 sians, Karweh; to the natives of the Malay Archipelago as 

 Kopi, and finally Kaffa or Caffia by the inhabitants of 

 that district, situated in the Province of Narca, in south- 

 eastern Abyssinia, where it is to be found growing in wild 

 abundance, even at the present day, whence its botanical 

 name, Coffea, adopted by Linnaeus and others. 



The genus known as Coffea is divided by botanists 

 into some sixty species, of which fifteen are referred to 

 Africa, seven to Asia and about twenty-two to America ; 

 but there is abundant reason for supposing that the 

 majority of these so-called species are but mere varieties, 

 a single genus^ due to different conditions of soil, climate 

 and cultivation, three of which it will be sufficient for all 

 practical purposes to distinguish in this work. It is 

 classed botanically as a species coming under the head 

 of the Pentayidria of Linnaeus and the family Riibicece, 

 although by others it is placed among the Cinchonaceces 

 family of plants which comprise numerous species of 

 tropical berry-bearing shrubs, one of which only is 

 known to possess valuable properties celebrated for the 



