286 [Assembly 



dia Company, under their gigantic chartered monopoly, stood like 

 an avenging angel with flaming sword to defend and protect their 

 paradisaical Tea gardens from the encroaching foot of the less privi- 

 leged. But I alwa}'s succeeded in getting in a small quantity. That 

 Tea delighted and astonished all who drank of it. The room where 

 it was made was perfumed with the most delicate and exquisite fra- 

 grance and the luxury to all lovers of good Tea, could not be par- 

 alleled in London. At that time I only knew the fact, but was en- 

 tirely ignorant of the cause of this excellence. But since my atten- 

 tion has been drawn to the cultivation of the Tea plant in the Uni- 

 ted States, I learn that all the Tea destined for the Russian market 

 from China, is sun dryed, and all of course transported by land car- 

 riage. The mystery is explained, the cause of superiority developed 

 and a lesson recorded foi- our instruction. 



Age is detrimental to the quality of Tea. It divests it of a por- 

 tion of its aromatic properties, and causes a lifeless, spiritless, taste- 

 less insipidity. The charter of the English East India Company 

 compelled the corporation always to keep a year's stock on hand. 

 The consequence was, the people of England always drank old, and 

 therefore bad Tea, sometimes two or three years old. It is a singu- 

 lar fact that they had used it for so long a time, that even the old 

 Tea dealers of London were perfectly satisfied that old Tea was bet- 

 ter than new, and that no Tea was fit for use until it had been kept 

 two or three years. At the time when the East India Company mon- 

 opoly was abrogated in 1833, and went into full effect in April, 1834, 

 I remember holding an argument with an old Tea dealer in London, 

 who had been all his life in the Tea trade, upon this identical point. 

 He maintained most strenuously that we should find the opening of 

 the Tea trade a most tremendous and aggravated evil, because the 

 market would be inundated with fresh Tea, and we should have none 

 old enough to be fit for use. In corroboration of ray opposite views, 

 I mentioned to him a circumstance which occurred in 1807. I was 

 on a journey in company with the late Col. Humphrey ex-minister 

 to the court of Madrid, and his lady from Rotterdam to Paris. We 

 arrived after stopping a short time at Antwerp, at Brussels in the 

 afternoon. Being much fatigued, for we had no steam ships or rail- 

 roads in existence then, we ordered Tea with our dinner. It was 

 peculiarly fine and exceedingly fragrant; I could find none equal to 

 it in London I called the waiter to enquire where it was obtained. 

 He replied that an American ship had just arrived at Antwerp from 

 China, and this was some of her tea. Here was another exemplifi- 

 cation, and it seems extraordinary that any exemplification at all 



