June i, 1894.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
797 
TEA GROWING IN THE UNITED 
STATES. 
Consul B. H. Raw?on- Walker has forwArdeil a re- 
port to the Foreign Office on the Experimeiitil Tea 
Farm at Siinimerville, a Suburb some twenty miles 
(distant from Ohar'eston, which owing to the climaMo 
conditioDS of that part of the State of South Caro- 
lina, gives promise that great success will attend the 
oultivation of the plant in question. It appesra that 
Dr. Shepard started experimental tea Rardens a* 
Summerville, South Carolina, which have been carried 
on very successfully, and from a report he has made 
to the Agricultural Department at Washington, Mr. 
Rawaon- Walker makes the following extracts : — 
From this report it would appear that the first tea 
plant in this section of the United States was planted 
by the French botanist, Michaux, 1804, at Middleton 
Barony, on the Ashley River, distant some 15 miles 
from Charleston. With it was planted out the first 
representative of its cousin, the Camslia Japonica. 
Dr. Shepard states that he saw the former tree a 
few years ago, and that it had grown into a small 
tree, about 15 feet in height, while of the latter there 
were many specimens fully twice as tall. 
The publications of the United States Patent 
Office and the United States Department of Agri- 
culture record the results of many subsequent attempts 
to inaugurate an American tea industry. It would 
appear that repeated failure has not checked the 
ardour of those engaged in these experiments. The 
little patches, and, in some instances, large gardens, 
which have resulted from these attempts, have produced 
tea of tine flavour, although very generally devoid of 
that stre igth of infusion which appears to constitute a 
rooat desirab'e quality for many tra-drinkers. It m»y 
be presumed howeier, that this failure in puogeocy 
was largely due to detective cnriog, and especially to 
inat'eqiiate rolling of the leaf in coos quence of vfhich 
the cup qna'ities were not fu ly developed. St far as 
's generally bnowo, it reraainei for the National 
Department of Agriculture to begin, about ten yeirs 
ago, the fi'flt serious at'empt to produco American 
coromerctRl tea on a fc»le mfficiently large to arrive 
at a decisive result. Various causes contributed to 
the toial abandonment by the Gove-nmont of the 
girdena which it had establisl c i at great expense on 
a plnDtation c»ilel NewinsTon about a mil-i dis'aot 
from Pinehuret Farm, which also oocstituted a part 
of the same large estate. 
The present experiment owes its nndert iking 
to the belief that the previous trials to produce 
tea in the United States were arre-ted before 
reaching definite eonclusiocs— that mora careful 
oultivation and preparation, which might be the 
result of a lengthened local observation, and the 
Rubseqnent production of a higher class of teas 
might reverse the generally entertained opinion that, 
as an industry, the cultivation of tea in this country 
must always prove a fiilure ; and that, if success- 
ful, this new field for agricultural enterprise would 
furnish a wide and comparatively easy out-door 
employment for m*ny who are unequal to those 
rougher operations, whose accomplishment under a 
summer's sun can be borne but by few in this climate. 
It needed only the annoonoemeDt of the revival 
of tea experiments in this country to excite the 
liveliest interest and assistance for the undertaking. 
The United States Department of Agriculture has 
generously boroe a considerable part of the oipendi- 
ture for procuring consignments of tea seed from 
Asia. The Department of State has kindly issued 
ordtra to its Consuls at the tea ports to obtaia these 
samples, and the foreign representatives of the 
United States Qovernmoot have sparaJ no efforts to 
secure the beat quality ot seed. 
QUALITY OF TEA PRODUCED AT PINEHOBST FABM. 
During the past summer of 1893 some of the Pine- 
burst plants were satficiontly advanced to warrant 
picking the leaf. The great majority of them bad 
been raised from seed in 1889 and planted out that 
autumn ; a limited number were a lew months older. 
They belong to the As'am hybrid variety, i..,., the 
orcbl bst'^eeo the Aisameie and Chioeie >oiti, and 
come from stock that had been thoroughly aeoli- 
maiised by probably 30 years' growth in this country. 
The plants had been systematically " topped " with 
garden shears, and a'terwatda carefully pruni'd with 
a knife during the winter of 1891-92, and thrjugh- 
out their growth had hen carefully cultivated and 
generously manured — they covered sma'I areas on 
various soils, viz., under-drained pond dnd high swamp, 
the slope of a clay-hill, end a flat, sindy piaeland. 
So free had been the artificial enrichment of all 
these plants that no material difference in the quality 
or quantity of yield were observed. It was designed 
to test by thcs"! first experiments whether commercial 
tea could be raised at all. The results for picking 
and curing such leaf aa appeared to be suitable for 
manufncture, and might be spared without impairing 
the snbs quent luxuriant development of the plants, 
are given in a report by the United States Se- 
cretary of Agriculture, dated November, 1892, a? fol- 
lows :— I wish to say that we are much please I with 
the samples. A sample was sent to a travelling agent 
of a large tea firm in Detroit for bis jodf^ment, ad- 
vising him as to where the tea was produced. He took 
the tea to his store, and without giving them any in- 
formation with regard to the s>me, it was tested by 
two ot the leading members of the firm, each making 
a separate test — they pronounced it very excellent 
English breakfast to», and as I recollect claimed that 
it was better than any breakfast tea they bad in the 
store or at least equally good, and when the informa- 
tion was given them as to the place of production, they 
were very much surprised and wished to know it any 
considerable amount could be purchased. 
Mr Gilb( rt Gill, of Martin, Gilbert & Co., Ba'timore, 
Marylanii, also pronounced it equal to the best high 
grade English breakfast tea, and superior to many 
grades that come from India and China, 
YIELD OF TEA. 
The Piuehnrst plants were set out at a greater 
distance than is tno practice in the Eis*, with the 
objfct ot substituting cultivators and ploughs drawn 
by mules for hand labour and the spade. After mak- 
ing due allowanci for this difference and for avirage 
vicancics (where plants have died), and thus estima'- 
ing the pioduotion by the same number of plants, 
we find the average of the Pinehurst gardens for the 
past s ason to have reached about 37* lbs. of cured 
tea per acre of the earlier "flushes," purposely very 
little was picked of the midsummer ones, we were 
careful to confine the pickings to the smallest leaf 
and in the a'ltumn we had at lea^t oue abundant 
flush that was permitted to remain on the bushes — 
in other words, the standard production as laid down 
by Colonel Money, the expert in tea planting, might 
readily have been attained. Indeed, in view of 
subsequent events, it would have been better to have 
picked the late (October) flush, as probably thereby 
we might have prevented the florescence of the plants 
with all its attendant drain on the resources, and 
subsequent entailed cost of picking off the incipient 
seed, in order to prevent the yet further exhaustion 
of the bushes by its full development through the 
next season. But we will assume that the Indian 
grower exercises as much care with his own gardens, 
and we will re 't our case on the actual figures sub- 
mitted. The results at Pinehurst are all the more 
gratifying, as they were obtained on plants exhibit- 
ing great difl'ereuce iu form and luxuriance of growth 
and flushing — the seed from which thoy sprang had 
been brought from India long before the inauguration 
of the recent successful attempt to raise the grades 
of those teas by a judicious selection of seed, and 
most careful cultivi*ion. From the gardens now be- 
ing established at Pi' ehurst, and in consequence of 
the great care bestowed on their composition, it is 
hoped to obtain much finer teas in the future. — L. and 
C. Express, April 21), 
BANANA FLOUR. 
As liritish I'autral .\fric\ is e-nphatiniHy ft land 
of the B»iia' i or at any rate of the variety (•»lled 
the plaintaiu, the following extract (rum Mr. Staalay'f 
