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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



A MAP OF FORMOSA ( TAIWAN) SHOWING ITS GEOGRAPHICAL RELATION TO JAPAN, 



CHINA, AND THE PPIIUPPINES 



United States. The little that goes to Eng- 

 land is generally used in making choice 

 blends in combination with other teas. 



GUARDING TEA FROM OBNOXIOUS FREIGHT 



As an additional protective measure, 

 each chest is sewn up in reed matting. 

 So sensitive is tea to other freight that a 

 tea merchant, before he loads his cargo, 

 has to find out what goods a ship is 

 carrying in her hold. Tea and copra, 

 for instance, cannot travel together with 

 anything approaching congeniality. More- 

 over, if it so happens that some Asiatic 

 disease breaks out on the ship and the 

 hold is fumigated, the tea might just as 

 well have caught the disease and died, 

 for its commercial life is at an end. 



Besides the Oolong- tea, whose natural 



fragrance is of the sort to commend it- 

 self to the most fastidious tea-bibber, 

 there is an artificially scented tea, called 

 Pouchong, produced in Formosa. This 

 is exported chiefly to the Philippines and 

 the Straits Settlements for Chinese con- 

 sumption. 



Four kinds of flowers are used in the 

 process of scenting Pouchong — two va- 

 rieties of jasmine, white oleanders, and 

 gardenias. These flowers are grown in 

 great quantities outside the city of Tai- 

 hoku for this purpose, and are bartered 

 on a certain street corner in Daitotei. 



I shall always recall this street corner 

 as the abode of Perfume — an oasis of 

 Fragrance in a hostile desert. Coming 

 down Hokumongai, the principal street 

 in Daitotei, the sensitive western nose is 



