m 



Report on the manufacture of Tea, and on the 



[July 



box of damaged Tea. After the Teas have been well tat-hed and mixed 

 up with other sorts, these leave?, give them a pleasant fragrance. The 

 Son fa plant is about two feet high, and kept in flower pots ; it is pro- 

 pagated from the roots. The Qui fa plant is from three to four feet 

 high ; one pound of the flowers is put to a box of Tea. This plant was 

 seen in the Botanical Gardens at Calcutta by our Chinese interpreter. 

 The flowers of this plant are considered finer than those of the Son fa. 

 I annex a rough drawing of each of them, as given to me by ihe inter- 

 preter ; the dots in the drawings are intended for small flowers.* 



The Black-Tea makers appear to me to be very arbitrary in 

 their mode of manufacture ; sometimes they will take the leaves 

 of the Thowvng-P<;ho, or perhaps Twuz?e-Paho ; but if it has 

 been rainii g, or there is any want of coolies to pluck the leaves 

 quickly, or from any other cause, they will let the leaves grow 

 a few days longer, and turn all into Souchong ; which it must be re- 

 membered, takes a'l the small leaves above it. If it is ihe first crop, 

 the Souchong and Pouchong leaves may all be turned into Souchong 

 Tea; but even if it is the second crop, when the Pouchong leaves ought 

 not to be gathered, they are nevertheless p^ ke l and mix^d up with the 

 Souchong leaves Almost all our B'a k and all the Green Teas h tve 

 just been made from one garden. When the Green-Tea makers com- 

 plained that the leaves were beginning to get too large for them — that is, 

 they were fast growing out ot Souchong and running into Pumhonj — the 

 Black-Tea makers took up the manufacture, plucked all ihe leaves, and 

 made excellent Pouchong; so that between the two, there is not a leaf 

 lost. When the Black-Tea makers have a garden to themselves they are 

 cruel pluckers, for they almost strip the tree of leaves for the Souchong, 

 and are not at all nice in the plucking; the third and even the fourth leaf 

 on a tender twig is nipped off in the twinkling of an eye ; they then look 

 about for more young leaves, and away go the Pouchong, and Toychong 

 too, which is the largest leaf of all. But the Green-Tea men pluck qui- 

 etly, one by one, down to Souchong. The Black-Tea men separate all 

 their Teas into first, second, third, and fourth crop j but the Green Tea 



* These two sketches are not deemed sufficiently instructive to be added here. One 

 of them is entitled Qui fa which is the name of the Olea fragrans, or Sweet-scented 

 Olive, the flowers of which are said to be used for perfuming Teas. Kutiti morelike 

 the Aglaia adorata, a very different plant, which is also supposed to be applied in China 

 for a similar purpose. This last, however, is called Tsjiulang by the Chinese, accord- 

 ing to Rumpf, and Sam yeip lan according to Roxburgh. The other sketch, entitled 

 Lanfa, seems to be intended for a liliaceous, or at any rate aa endogenous plant. I 

 am unable to offer any conjecture about it— N. W. 



