320 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. [November t, 1880. 
for much of his information to many of the English 
and German authors enumerated, he commences his 
remarks. Iu his preface he explains that in the 
course of an addiess ou the products and exports 
01 British India, recently delivered by him in Prague, 
he alluded to the fact that ou the Continent 
of Europe tea was generally known only aa either 
Kussian or Chinese, and that it was barely known 
that India produced a large and annually increasing 
quantity of high-class teas, which are largely used 
in Loudon tor mixing with an improving China tea. 
The correspondence which ensued when these re- 
marka were reported by the local press, induced 
him to publish the present work as the result of 
information he had the opportunity of collecting, 
while serving iu India for eight years as paUeontologist 
to the Geological Survey. 
It is Dr. Feistmantel's aim to place before the 
German-speaking peoples of the Continent as complete 
au exposition of the conditions of the tea industry 
in India, as has already been laid before English- 
speaking people by other writers; and he therefore 
begins with an abstract of the early history of the 
tea-plant in India, the date of its first discovery 
as an indigenous shrub, and its first introduction 
into the different districts in which it is now culti- 
vated. He mentions the first export from India to 
England in 1838 of twelve chests of tea, which sold 
for 19a 5ci per pound. 
He points out the difference betweeu the indigen- 
ous, the "China," and the hybrid varieties of the 
plant which are cultivated iu Iudia, and enumerates 
the various pseudo-tree which are known either in 
the frontier countries of India or in other countries ; 
such as Osyris nepaleHsis or arboret, in Kurnaon- 
Garliwal, and lately in Kashmir ; Elaodendron per- 
cicum in Burma, from which, when mixed with oil, 
salt, garlic, and assafcetida is prepared the nauseous 
compound, to European taste, known as " pickled tea," 
Ilex paraguayensis, the Paraguay tea, or ''Mate," 
of South America; Ledum palustre, or Labrador tea; 
the Tasmanian tea, made from various varieties of 
Melaleuca and Leptospermum ; and the Faham tea, 
Augrwcuni fragrans of Mauritius; and others. 
The number of the plantations in the various pro- 
vinces, area under cultivation, and annual yield of tea 
for all India, are given in detail ; and the difference 
betweeu the various kinds of China ami Indian tea, 
as proved by analysis, are very fully treated of. 
The principal black teas made in India are flowery 
pekoe, orange pekoe, souchong, pekoe souchong, congou, 
and bohea ; as also the several varieties of broken leaf, 
such as broken peuoe, pekoe dust, &c. All these are 
not, as is commonly supposed, the produce of different 
plants, but are prepared from one and the same plant, 
the classification being caused by the difference of age 
and development of the leaves used for the several 
varieties. The principal kinds of green tea are gun-' 
powder, hyson, and young hyson, and these are 
manufactured almost exclusively in the North-West 
Provinces and Kangra. 
It may be accepted as a fact that Indian tea is 
very rarely adulterated, being packed on the plan- 
tation, and shipped direct from the planter to the 
market; but "China tea" passes through many hands 
before it is packed for shipment, and is frequently 
mixed with willow or other leaves, or with artificial 
colouring-matter. But the adulterated tea is not now 
readily saleable in London, and is therefore re-exported 
to the Continent. A direct importation of tea from India 
to the Continent would insure the purity of the supply. 
In a lecture given before the Society of Arts, in 
May last, by Mr. J. Berry White, and quoted by 
Dr. Feistmantel, a table is given showing the steady 
ri.n: of the Indian tea crop from 232,000 pounds iu 
1852 to 76,586,000 pounds in 1886; and Mr. White 
estimated that the crop for 1887 would not fall far 
short of 90,000,000 pounds. The amount of tea ex- 
ported from [ndia between October 1, 1885 and Septem- 
ber 30, 1880, in officially roturnod as 08,781,219 pounds, 
ol which 60,0 711* pounds went to England. Nearly 
the whole ol this tea is consumed in Great Britain, 
a small quantity bciug sent to the Continent mixed 
with inferior China teas, and consequently sold as 
China tea. The precentage of Indian tea used m England 
has also been steadily risiug, for whereas in 1865, 
China tea formed 97 per cent of the entire consump- 
tion, in the first quarter of 1887 the proportion was 
51 p r ;r ceut of Indian to 49 per cent of China tea. 
Notwithstanding the steadily increasing production 
in Ind a, China tea is still imported into the country ; 
iu 1885-86 about four million pounds were imported, 
but mainly into Bombay, where none is grown, and 
much of it for re-export to the Persian Gulf, Af- 
ghanistan, and some to Trieste, where it arrives as 
Indian tea. 
Statistics concerning the consumption of tea show 
that the greatest tea-drinkers are the Australians, 
who iu 1881 consumed 81 ounces per head of the 
population. England ranked next with 73 ounces, 
while the United States of America came next with 
21 ounces. Prussia, Belgium, Holland, and Denmark 
rank highest among Continental nation as tea-drinkers, 
but they only consume from 7 to 8 ounces per head 
of the population. Dr. Feistmantel fully indorses 
the prevalent English opinion as to the superiority 
of ludiau to China tea, and attributes its being al- 
most unknown on the Continent mainly to the fact 
that "China tea" is a much older, and therefore 
better known, product throughout Europe. Even in 
England, Indian tea took years to establish its re- 
putation. It will iu the eud be as much appreciated 
on the Continent as it is in this country if a few 
merchants and tradesmen in different Continental cities, 
whose commercial standing will be a guarantee for 
the purity of the goods they supply, are induced to 
keep it. A special chapter is devoted to the culti- 
vation of tea iu Ceylon, and shows the marvellous 
progress made by this new industry in consequence of 
the coffee disease having caused the conversion of so 
many coffee plantations into tea plantations. In 1875 
only 1080 acres were under tea, whereas in 1885 no 
less than 102,000 acres were occupied by it, and the 
exports rose from 82 pounds in 1875-76 to nearly 
four milliou pounds in 1884-85. The plantations are 
principally in the western and southern provinces of 
Ceylon.*' Dr. Feistmantel's work, concludes with an 
interesting chapter ou caravan teas, compiled from 
an article by Herr Walter Japha, published in the Reme 
Goloniale Internationale for September-October 1887. 
Some amongst us are apt to feel a certain amount 
of jealousy at the not infrequent employment of 
foreigners iu Government appointments, and this feeling 
is perhaps intensified by the knowledge that iu this 
matter, as in Free Trade, there is no apparent 
reciprocity — for we seldom hear of the employment 
of Englishmen by Continental Governments; but 
the present is an instance, and by no means a soli- 
tary one, of the great service done to us by foreigners 
who avail themselves of the information .they have 
collected in the course of their employment by our 
Government to diffuse among their fellow country- 
men such an intelligent knowledge of the produc- 
tions of our distant possessions, as is calculated to 
largely benefit commerce or by leading to an ex- 
tensive demand for the goods of which they write. 
It would seem, however, scarcely just that the 
work of diffusing this knowledge should be left to 
other nations, seeing that the benefits are to be reaped 
by ourselves. It is hardly likely that in England it 
will be recognized, as it is in some other countries, 
to be part of the dutios of any Government Depart- 
ment ; but why should it not be part of the work 
of such a body as the London Chamber of Commerce, 
or the new Imperial Institute, to disseminate infor- 
mation regarding our Colonial and Indian products 
among Continental nations, and to translate and 
circulate any useful works on commercial and kindred 
subjects, published in foreign languages, among such 
classes of the community as they would be likely to 
interest 'i — Indian Tea Gazette. 
* A curious mistake : the cultivation of tea in 
the AVestern and Southern Provinces is advancing, 
but the vast majority of the tea estates are iu the 
Central Proviuce, a large proportion in truth being 
converted coll'ee estates. — Ed. 
