82 TEA 



Tea usually leaves home for foreign lands in big 

 steamers. The most notable exception to this rule is 

 found in the method of transporting brick tea from 

 China to Tibet. The bricks, done up in bamboo 

 wrappers, travel by " cooUe caravans " ; numbers of 

 them are fastened together into loads, and the loads 

 are shouldered by men and women, who set off in 

 parties to carry them to their destination. 



Many Steamship Companies now carry tea across 

 the seas. But the connection of the Peninsular and 

 Oriental Steam Navigation Company with this trade 

 is particularly interesting, for it is a link with the days 

 when tea travelled in sailing ships, and had most 

 enviable, adventurous voyages in those romantic 

 vessels. 



The days when the beautiful sailing cHppers raced 

 home from China round the Cape, for the honour — 

 and profit — of bringing to port the first cargo of " new 

 season's tea," passed away finally with the opening of 

 the Suez Canal. Such ships, with some such dashing 

 name as the Cutty Sark, got their living by carrying on 

 the exchange of Western commodities for China tea, 

 at a time when tea was still rather a luxury than a 

 necessity, and when all grades of tea commanded a 

 much higher price in European markets than is the 

 case to-day. These ships were, so to speak, bred for 

 the sport ; long, narrow, deep, and fast — not carrying 

 much as cargo bulk is measured nowadays — the highly 

 profitable nature of their trade rendered the employ- 

 ment of these " thoroughbreds " practicable ; and 

 there is more than one recorded mstance of two or 

 more evenly matched tea-clippers leaving Woosing 

 simultaneously for the same destination, usually the 



