44 TEA 



men, whose previous habits had better qualified them 

 for discussing the merits of port wine and bottled 

 porter, compared it somewhat irrelevantly to chopped 

 straw, and some were pleased to display their facetious- 

 ness by observing that a mixture of gunpowder was 

 wanted to make it go oiBf." 



As a result of these experiments with the native tea- 

 plant, India became less interested in the seeds for 

 which she had sent to China. Several thousand 

 plants, however, were raised at the Botanical Gardens, 

 Calcutta, from the imported seed, and were sent to 

 Kumaon, in the Himalayas, and the adjacent provinces, 

 to Assam and to Mysore. For some time experiments 

 were carried on in crossing the Assam and China plants, 

 there being a strong feeling in favour of the idea that a 

 hybrid variety of this kind would constitute the finest 

 stock. But by-and-by India came to the conclusion, 

 which has proved so sound, that her best interests, 

 and those of customers, would be served by a purely 

 Indian stock. 



The second shipment of Indian tea was made in 

 1839. It consisted of ninety -five chests; ten of 

 these were given away amongst people specially inter- 

 ested in the industry, and the remaining eighty-five 

 were sold at public auction on March 17, 1840. This 

 export fetched from 4s. to lis. per lb. 



By 1850, there were about 1,000 acres of land in 

 India under tea, and the total production for the year 

 was about 250,000 lbs. By 1890 the area under tea 

 was 344,822 acres, and the annual production had risen 

 to over 112,000,000 lbs. By 1909, India had increased 

 her tea-growing area to over 555,000 acres and her 

 annual production to close upon 261,000,000 lbs. Since 



