1834.] Range for the Culture of the Tea Plant. 181 



periodically about mid-summer ; that in the higher parts of the coun- 

 try heavy snow falls in winter, with intense frost ; that the mean 

 temperature of the summer is 83°, and that of winter, 39°. 



It may now be worth considering the countries into which the tea 

 plant has been introduced and failed. 



At Penang, close to the line, with a mean annual heat of 80°, and equa- 

 ble climate the whole year round, and an excessive fall of rain, amounting 

 to nearly 80 inches for the year ; the climate is in every respect so much 

 in contrast with that of China, that the tea could not be expected to 

 be grown. The same is the case with St. Helena, where although the 

 mean heat for the year is 73°, the thermometer does not fall in winter 

 below 55°, and the climate is moist and cloudy. Of the causes of failure 

 in Java I am less able to judge, but they are likely to be found in its 

 low latitude, 6° 9', the excessive moistness of the climate, and the 

 great fall of rain during the year. At Rio Janeiro, tea was tried under 

 a colony of Chinese, and failed, perhaps from being within the tropic, 

 and its too great heat, with a moist and generally equable climate. It has 

 been twice attempted by the French in the Carribee Islands. The first 

 occasion in Martinique was a failure. I do not know the result of the 

 second, but a lat. any where between 11° and 19°, with the kind of 

 climate consequently implied, gives little chance of success. 



There is perhaps no part of the Company's territories in India which 

 supplies all the conditions of the tea districts of China, in respect of 

 climate. But there are situations which approach it so nearly, as 

 strongly to bear out the conclusion, that tea may be so successfully 

 produced in this country as to be an object of high commercial import- 

 ance. It appears to me that this can be expected in no part of 

 the plains of India. The mean annual heat of the climate from 30° N. 

 down to the parallel of Calcutta, is much beyond that of the tea culti- 

 vation in China. We have in addition to an excessive summer heat, with 

 either hot winds or a close scorching air during the day, a barely 

 temperate winter cold, and heavy periodical rains. We certainly get some 

 Chinese fruits, such as the lechee, the loquat, and the wampee to grow, 

 but the tea plant appears to require a greater cold to thrive in. It 

 has been seen that the annual heat of the southern limit of tea cultiva- 

 tion in China, assumed to extend to Canton, is 73°* Fahr. At Seharun- 

 pur, which may be considered as at the northern limit nearly of the 

 plains of Hindustan, 8° of lat. higher and 1000 ft. above the sea, the 

 mean temperature of the year is 73° Fahr. ; the temperature of June, i* 

 90°, and of January, 52°. 



* At the level of the sea. 



