394 



HISTORY OF THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 



pointed, waved, three to four inches long, placed 

 opposite on short footstalks. They are ever- 



147. 



Coffee. 



green, and somewhat resemble those of the Por- 

 tuguese laurel. The flowers are white, in form 

 not unlike those of the jessamine. They are 

 axillary, on short footstalks; or sessile, two or 

 three together. The calyx is very small, tubular, 

 and five toothed. The corolla is monopetalous, 

 funnel-shaped, cut at the limb into five reflexed, 

 oval, or lanceolate segments. The fruit which 

 succeeds is a red berry, resembling a cheiTy, and 

 having a pale, insipid, and somewhat glutinous 

 pulp, inclosing two hard oval seeds, each about 

 the size of an ordinary pea. One side of the seed 

 is convex, while the other is flat, and has a little 

 straight furrow inscribed through its longest 

 dimension ; while growing, the flat sides of the seeds 

 are towards each other. These seeds are immedi- 

 ately covered by a cartilaginous membrane, 

 which has received the name of the 'parchment. 



Some botanists have enumerated two distinct 

 species of the coffee tree. The c. Arahica, and c. 

 ocddentalis; others, again, are of opinion that the 

 different sorts are only varieties, resulting from 

 soil, climate, and mode of culture. The tree is 

 a native of Arabia Felix, and Ethiopia, and was 

 first introduced to the notice of Europeans by 

 Rauwolfius, in 1573; but Alpinus, in 1691, was 

 the first who scientifically described it. The 

 Dutch were the first to introduce the plant into 

 Europe. Having procured some berries at Mo- 

 cha, which were carried to Batavia, and there 

 planted, a specimen was sent to Amsterdam in 

 the year 1690, by governor Wilson, where it 

 bore fruit, and produced many young plants. 

 From these, the East Indies, and most of the 

 gardens of Europe, were furnished. It was 

 first cultivated in Britain by bishop Compton, in 

 1696. In 1714 a plant was presented by the 

 magistrates of Amsterdam to the French king, 

 Louis XIV. This plant was placed at Marley 

 under the care of the celebrated Jussieu; and 

 from this source plants were forwarded some 

 years after to the French islands in the West 



Indies, from whence all the coffee plants now 

 found there derived their origin. 



The use of coflFee as an alimentary infusion 

 was known in Arabia, where the plant is sup- 

 posed to have been indigenous, long before the 

 period just mentioned. All authorities agree in 

 ascribing its introduction to Megalleddin, mufti 

 of Aden, in Arabia Felix, who had become ac- 

 quainted with it in Persia, and had recourse to 

 it medicinally when he returned to his own 

 country. The progress which it made was by 

 no means rapid at first, and it was not until the 

 year 1554 that coffee was publicly sold at Con- 

 stantinople. Its use had, in the meanwhile, been 

 much checked by authority of the Syrian govern- 

 ment on the ground of its alleged intoxicating 

 qualities: but more probably because of its lead- 

 ing to social and festive meetings incompatible 

 with the strictness of Mahommedau discipline. 



A similar persecution attended the use of coffee 

 soon after its introduction into the capital of 

 Turkey, where the ministers of religion having 

 made it the subject of solemn complaint that the 

 mosques were deserted while the cofl^ee houses 

 were crowded, these latter were shut up by order 

 of the mufti, who employed the police of the 

 city to prevent any one from drinking coffee. 

 This prohibition it was found impossible to es- 

 tablish, so that the government, with that in- 

 stinctive facility so natural to rulers of convert- 

 ing to their own advantage the desires and pre- 

 judices of the people, laid a tax upon the sale of the 

 beverage, which produced a considerable revenue. 



The consumption of cofffee is exceedingly great 

 in Turkey, and this fact may be in a great mea- 

 sure accounted for by the strict prohibition which 

 the Moslem religion lays against the use of wine 

 and spirituous liquors. So necessary was coffee 

 at one time considered among the people, that 

 the refusal to supply it in reasonable quantity 

 to a wife, was reckoned among the legal causes 

 for a divorce. The Turks drink their coffee very 

 hot and strong, and without sugar; occasionally 

 they put in, when boiling, a clove or two bruised, 

 or a few seeds of staiTy aniseed, or some of the 

 lesser cardaniums, or a drop of essence of amber.* 



Much uncertainty prevails with respect to the 

 first introduction of coffee into use in the western 

 parts of Europe. The Venetians, who traded 

 much with the Levant, were probably the first 

 to adopt its use. A letter, written in 1615 from 

 Constantinople, by Peter de la Valle, a Vene- 

 tian, acquaints his correspondent with the writer's 

 intention of bringing home to Italy some coffee, 

 which he speaks of as an article unknown in his 

 own country. Thirty years after this, some 

 gentlemen returning from Constantinople to Mar- 

 seilles, brought with them a supply of this lux- 

 ury, together with the vessels required for its 

 preparation; but it was not until 1671 that the 

 * Ellia's History of Coffee. 



