2 COFFEE : ITS CULTIVATION AND PROFIT. 



The Medina Sheik Abd-el-Kader is the oldest 

 historical authority on the use of " blood red 

 Keweh," as the Tunisian Ibu Waki named the 

 beverage. It may be assumed that the Coffee 

 Plantations of Yemen increased until the yield 

 served for export as well as for home consump- 

 tion. In the 1 6th century mention is made of 

 the consumption of Coffee by the Turks, and 

 Lord Bacon among other writers alludes to it. 

 The Coffee came by ships from Mocha to Suez, 

 and overland by caravans to Damascus and Aleppo, 

 the total export from Mocha in the middle of the 

 1 7th century being estimated by Dufour at about 

 16,000 bales, weighing about 300 Ibs. each, i.e., 

 about 2,150 tons. Rauwolfius brought some young 

 plants to Western Europe in 1573, and Alpinus 

 stood sponsor to them, scientifically describing and 

 naming the botanical curiosities in 1591. This 

 seems to have drawn some attention to the new 

 shrub, for Bishop Compton successfully reared a 

 few plants in the uncongenial English soil during 

 1696 and subsequently. Then the Dutch, with 

 their native talent for making secondhand dis- 

 coveries, fabricated a legend of trees which had 

 not only flowered, but borne fruit, in the fogs of 

 the Lowlands adding a rider to this statement 

 by asserting the seed from this source to have 

 been that whence most of the gardens of the 

 East Indies were initiated. It is at least certain 

 that the plant was known to the savants of the 



