180 Beport on the manufacture of Tea, and on the [July 



raised from seed, you may expect a small crop of Tea the third year, 

 but they do not come to maturity under six years. It is said they live 

 to the age of forty or fifty years. The Chinese way of digging a hole, 

 and putting in a handful or two of seed, does not succeed so well in this 

 country, as putting two or three seeds on small ridges of earth and 

 covering them over, which I have found to answer better. 



In clearing a new Tea tract, if the jungle trees are very large and 

 numerous, it would be as well to make a clean sweep of the whole, by 

 cutting them and the Tea plants all down together ; for it would 

 be impossible to get rid of so much wood without the help of fire. 

 The Tea plants, if allowed to remain, would be of little use after 

 they had been crushed and broken by the fall of the large trees, and 

 dried up by the fire ; but admitting that they could escape all this, 

 the leaves of trees from twelve to twenty feet high could not be reach- 

 ed, and if they could, they would be almost useless for Tea manufac- 

 ture, as it is the young leaves, from young trees, that produce the best 

 Teas. But if all were cut down and set fire to, we should have a fine 

 clear tract at once, at the least expense, and might expect to have 

 a pretty good crop of Tea one year after the cutting, or, at furthest, the 

 second year ; for it is astonishing with what vigour the plant shoots up 

 after the fire has been applied. And we gain by this process ; for, from 

 every old stock or stump cut down, ten to twelve'more vigorous shoots 

 spring up, so that in the place of a single plant you have now a fine 

 Tea bush. I think from what I have seen of these plants, that if 

 cut down every third year, they would yield far superior Teas; neither 

 am I singular in this opinion ; the Green-Tea Chinamen having told me 

 that they cut down their plants every ninth year, which may be reckon- 

 ed equivalent to our third year, taking into consideration the size of our 

 trees and the richness of our soil. Our trees, or plants, are certainly 

 more than four or five times the size of theirs, and must consequently 

 yield so many times more produce ; theirs is the dwarf, ours the giant 

 Tea. The size of the leaf matters nothing, in my opinion, provided it 

 is young and tender ; even their diminutive leaf, if one day too old, is 

 good for nothing. 



As the Green-Tea Chinamen have just commenced operations, I will 

 try to give some account of this most interesting process. All leaves 

 up to the size of the Souchong are taken for the Green-Tea. About 

 three pounds of the fresh leaves, immediately they are brought in, are 

 cast into a hot pan (sometimes they are kept over night when abun- 

 dance have been brought in, and we have not been able to work all 

 up) j they are then rolled and tossed about in the pan until they 



