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IL A Difcourfe of C OFFEE^ read at a 
Meeting of the KOY Ah SOCIETY, 
l^j Mr. John Houghton, R R. S. 
SEveral have written of this^Plant, and particularly 
the Learned Mr.iRa^/in bis large Hiftory of PlantSj 
pag« 169I52. "J. But for its Defcription^ Ifliall only re- 
fer you to what was Publifhed by Dr. slcane^ in the 
lytb. Vol. of thefe Tranfadions , N^- 208. pag, 63. 
where is the Figure , Defcription, e^/T. 
At the- beginning of theTranfadion, is a Cut of the 
Branch, with its Leaves and Berries, only the Leaves are 
not fet oppofite one to another, as he tells me they 
to have been. 
I cannot learn the ufe of any part of this Plant, except 
the Berries, of which boird in Water, a Drink is made, 
and drunk much among the ArMans and Turks ^ and 
alfo now in Europe, 
How the y^r^^/w fell firft into the ufe of Coffee is 
hard to tell, perhaps 'twas their Succedmeum for Wine, 
which M^homet\i^di prohibited ^ nor how they come to 
Toaft it before boyling, which it's probable is owing to 
Chance, or perhaps a debauchM Palate, as fome with 
U5 love the burnt part of broil'd Mtat, and from fome 
great one, it might grow into a Fafliion, as the ufe of 
Tobacco and Coffee with us, although had they been 
impofed by a Law of the State, or Phyfieian;, it would 
have been thought very fevere. However it got head, 
Aaa for 
