512 Report on the manufacture of Tea, and on the [\June, 



quick succession, making the scene very animating; in this way a 

 great portion of the stalks are got rid of. After the Tea has been 

 well sifted and picked, it is again put into the hot pans and rub- 

 bed and rolled as before, for about one hour; it is then put into 

 shallow bamboo baskets, and once more examined, to separate the 

 different Teas that may still remain intermixed, and again put into 

 the hot pan. Now a mixture of sulphate of lime and indigo, very 

 finely pulverized and sifted through fine muslin, in the proportion 

 of three of the former to one of the latter, is added ; to a pan 

 of Tea containing about seven pounds, about half a tea-spoonful of 

 this mixture is put and rubbed and rolled along with the Tea in 

 the pan for about one hour, as before described. The Tea is then 

 taken hot from the pan and packed firmly in boxes, both hands 

 and feet being used to press it down. The above mixture is not 

 put to the Tea to improve its flavour, but merely to give it a uniform 

 color and appearance, as without it some of the Tea would be light 

 and some dark. The indigo gives it the colour, and the sulphate 

 of lime fixes it. The Chinese call the former Youngttn, the latter 

 Acco. Large Gunpowder Tea they call Tychen ; little Gunpowder 

 Cheocheu ; Hyson, Chingcha ; Young Hyson, Uchin ; Skin-Tea, or 

 old leaves in small bits, Poocha ; the fine Dust, or Powder-Tea, Cha- 

 moot. 



The leaves of the Green-Tea are not plucked the same as the Black, 

 although the tree or plant is one and the same, which has been proved 

 beyond a shadow of doubt ; for I am now plucking leaves for both 

 Green and Black from the same tract and from the same plants; 

 the difference lies in the manufacture, and nothing else. The Green- 

 Tea gatherers are accommodated with a small basket, each having 

 a strap passed round the neck so as to let the basket hang on the 

 breast. With one hand the man holds the branch, and with the 

 other plucks the leaf, one at a time, taking as high as the Souchong 

 leaf; a little bit of the lower end of the leaf is left for the young leaf to 

 shoot up close to it ; not a bit of stalk must be gathered. This is a very 

 slow and tedious way of gathering. The Black-Tea maker plucks the 

 leaves with great rapidity with both hands, using only the forefinger 

 and thumb, and collects them in the hollow of the hand ; when his 

 hand is full he throws the leaves into a basket under the shade of the 

 tree ; and so quickly does he ply his hands that the eye of a learner 

 cannot follow them, nor see the proper kind of leaf to be plucked ; all 

 that he sees, is the Chinaman's hands going right and left, his hands fast 

 filling, and the leaves disappearing. Our coolies, like the Green-Tea 

 Chinamen,hold the branch with one hand, and deliberately pluck off the 



