TEA. 



103 



Ball's "Account of the Cultivation and Manufacture of Tea," 

 Koyle's "Illustrations of Himalayan Botany," and his "Pro- 

 ductive Eesources of India." 



From Fortune's " Travels " I take the following extract 



" There are few subjects connected with the vegetable kingdom which have 

 attracted such a large share of public notice as the tea-plant of China. Its 

 cultivation on the Chinese hills, the particular species of variety which produces 

 the black and green teas of commerce, and the method of preparing the leaves, 

 have always been objects of peculiar interest. The jealousy of the Chinese 

 government in former times, prevented foreigners from visiting any of the dis- 

 tricts where tea is cultivated ; and the information derived from the Chinese 

 merchants, even scanty as it was, was not to be depended upon. And hence 

 we find our English authors contradicting each other ; some asserting that the 

 black and green teas are produced by the same variety, and that the diiference 

 in colour is the result of a different mode of preparation ; while others say that 

 the black teas are produced from the plant called by botanists Thea Bohea, and 

 the green from Thea viridis, both of which we have had for many years in our 

 gardens in England. During my travels in China since the last war, I have 

 had frequent opportunities of inspecting some extensive tea districts in the black 

 and green tea countries of Canton, Fokien, and Cliekiang : the result of these 

 observations is now laid before the reader. It will prove that even those who 

 have had the best means of judging have been deceived, and that the greater 

 part of the black and green teas which are brought yearly from China to Europe 

 and America are obtained from the sanie species or variety, namely, from the 

 Thea viridis. Dried specimens of this plant were prepared in the districts I 

 have named, by myself, and are now in the herbarium of the Horticultural 

 Society of London, so that there can be no longer any doubt upon the subject. 

 In various parts of the Canton provinces where I have had an opportunity of 

 seeing tea cultivated, the species proved to be the Thea Bohea, or what is com- 

 monly called the black tea plant. In the green tea districts of the n^rth — I 

 allude more particularly to the province of Chekiang — I never met with a 

 single plant of this species, which is so common in the fields and gardens near 

 Canton. All the plants in the green tea country near Kingpo, on the islands of 

 the Chusan Archipelago, and in every part of the province which I have had 

 an opportunity of visiting, proved, withovit an exception, to be Thea viridis. 

 Two hundred miles further to the northwest, in the province of Kiang-nan, 

 and only a short distance from the tea hills in that quarter, I also found in 

 gardens th.j same species of tea. Thus far my actual observations exactly 

 verified the opinions I had formed on the subject before I left England, viz : that 

 the black teas were prepared from the Thea Bohea, and the green from Thea viridis. 

 When I loft the north, on my way to the city of Foo-chow-foo, on the river 

 Min, in the province Fokien!^ I had no doubt that I should find the tea hills 

 there covered with the other species, Thea Bohea, from which we generally 

 suppose the black teas are made ; and this was the more likely to be the case 

 as this species actually derives its specific name from the Bohea hills in this 

 province. Great was my surprise to find all the plants on the tea hills near 

 Foo-chow exactly the same as those in the green tea districts of the north. 

 H ere were, then, green tea plantations on the black tea hills, and not a single 

 plant of the Thea Bohea to be seen. Moreover, at the time of my visit, the 

 natives were busily employed in the manufacture of black teas. Although the 

 specific differences of the tea plant were well known to me, I was so much sur- 

 prised, and I may add amused, at this discovery, that I procured a set of speci- 

 mens for the herbarium, and also dug up a living plant, which I took north- 

 ward to Chekiang. On comparing it with those which grow on the green tea 

 hills, no difference whatever was observed. It appears, therefore, that the 

 black and green teas of the northern districts of China (those districts in which 

 the greater part of the teas for the foreign market are made) are both produced 

 f]-om the same variety, and that that variety is the Thea viridis, or what is com- 

 monly called green tea plant. On the other hand those black and green teas 

 -\\ hich are manufactured in considerable quantities in the vicinity of Canton, 



