4f> 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
TEA AND SCANDAL. 
Tea ! Teal only Teal (Parody on Thee 1 Thee I only 
Thee ! by T. Mooie.) 
1 
The dawn oi the morn, the daylight's siuking, 
Five's cosy hour shall find me drinking 
Of Tea, Tea, only Tea ! 
When friends are met, and cups go round, 
And scinnals fresh have all enchanted, 
When butter'd toast is bravely browne I, 
My soul, lite Stiggin»'s is haunted 
By Tea, Tea, only Tea ! 
2 
When crispy curls the breakfast bacon, 
Coffee by me shall be forsaken, 
For Tea, Tea, only Tea! 
Like ocean, which by light or dark, 
Gulps down the rivers, re .ting never, 
The cup that cheers when cares do cark 
I eip or sing of, doting ever 
On Tea, Tea, only Tea! 
3 
I have no joy but cf its bringing, 
And nerves themselves seem nice when springing 
From T<a, Tea, inly Tea! 
Tea's spell there's naught on earth can break 
(1 hough Tea-cups can alas! be broken, ; 
Bohea the toper's sc. rn may ^ake; 
By me for aye the praise be spo.;eu 
Of Tea, Tea, only Tea!— [Punch, June 7th, 1881.] 
I have at last, after much hunting and enquiry found 
the wouderiul letter to a friend against the use of 
Tea by Jobn Wesley, to whioh Walter Besant relets 
in his 'London.' It 's too long to give here, but I 
bope to send it to jou separately for the T. A feme 
time. M anwhile 1 give yon one result of it. Adam 
Clarke, lU in a letter to a Preacher id 1812 thus 
wr.tes-— "Shun tia drinking visits: , these iu^enerai, 
rmuver time andean answer no gjod pu.poe either 
to jour body or soul. Ii you go oat tbis wa> at any 
time, let it be only whare you have every re a on 
to believe youc vi it is likely to be lutful to the s mis 
of the people. But ia it likely to be very useful 
where thereis* !a ge />cwty ! Th rty year* ago I met with 
Mr Wesley's letter on tea. I read it and resolved 
from that hour to drink do more of ttie juice cf 
that herb till I could answer hie arguments and 
objections. I have seen that tract but once since, yet 
from that day uutil now I h .ve not drank a cup of 
Tea or Coffee. For these things I mostly fouud a 
substitute in the morning, and when I oouid not I 
cheerfully weut.without breakfast ; and in their place 
I never tonk anything in the evening. By tbia ike 
of conduct I have not only joined bands with God to 
preserve a feeble constitution, but 1 can demonstrate 
that I have ac'ually saved who e years of time, which 
otherwise must have been irrecoverably lost, aud— 
perhaps my soul with them, for I have often bad 
occasion to observe that tea-drinking visits open the 
flood-gites of various temptations. How oan those 
exclaim against needless self-indulgenoe and waste of 
time who go out ou 6uoh occasions in the evenings ! 
It is a mystery to me which I never wish to be able 
to unravel, how men can aot in this way, and preach 
afterwards''. I have often wondered that this matter 
is never spoken of to the young preachers when they 
are admitted. But who can with propriety warn them 
aeainst ihis ev.i? only those who are guiltless ; and 
where are they? Alas! alas! do not we make a 
great outcry against evi's, however discreditable to 
us as Chtistiaus and ministers, which are in themselves 
and in their consequences of little moment in com- 
parison of this epidemic and dangerous disorder? 
But if our own conduct in this respect reproach us, 
should we, while honest m-n withhold the word of 
caution and advioe from our brother ?" 
Writing liko the above tends to do more harm than 
eood I should say, and b^ars out wbat George ft. Sims 
complains of in his Ballads of Babylon under the 
title of , , . „ 
The Dbinker's Dirge, 
i 
There's death in the Teapot, there's death in the jug ; 
Try a drain of cold water, death lurks in the mug. 
No drink unfermented from danger is tree, 
There are death and disease in Milk, Water, and Tea. 
2 
From the lead that in " waters " in lurking I abrlnk— 
Oh, tell me, good dc ctors, what, what on I drinn ! 
From the worship of Bacchus a convert I'd be, 
Yet you bid me beware of Milk, Water aud Tea. 
How a total-abstainer'6 to live Un't clear. 
For his conscience f jrbids him Win*, bpints and beer, 
And science comuiauds us f rum death he shoulo flee 
From those prisonous liquids, MiU, Water and Tea. 
4 
In irying from all things our lips to debar. 
Hasn't science just galloped his hobby too far ': 
Let the nervous go tbirstlng, they shan't frighten me 
With this nonsense concerning Milk. Water and Tea. 
Sine? quoting tbat wretshed man, WaUh, last week, 
I find that he has cribbed another part of his book 
from "The Art of Te» and Tea Blending," published by 
Wbittii'gham & Oo. I need not give jou eantpl<a aa 
tbey are of the same bold, uDtwisted quality as the 
last break. But here are some otber amusing eitracta 
which almost look like his owu composition. At p. 
38 be s»yu:— "By botanists it is termed Thta, thia 
lait name beiDg adopted b;' Lijnseus for the Bake 
of its Greek orthogrnphy being exactly tbat of Oex — 
a (ioddets — a coincidence d'>nr>tless quite acceptable 
to those who use and »njoy the bev. rage as it deserve* " 
Oex is the nearest approach he American ccm^oiitora 
could make to the Greek form Thca (Q fa ). 
Again nt p. 117 be says :— •' t'ejlou teas e'erive their 
tra >e names from the estates oi plantations oo wliiih 
the>y ore grown, being classed coinaieriiallv as 
' Ljocaudurii-,' ' MaittgnUs,' 'Ruiuw»l is,' ' K.and»- 
lcysB,' (sic!), ' Rakuwaus,' ' Mudul=un.a,' the timet 
being proiluocd in the districts of D.mlula and 
Doloabage." 
On Tuesday I took my cb Idren down to Amerphfttn 
for a Fpriug-fljwer hunt. Tl e balmy air was d< licioue, 
and we were arap.y rewarded by trmiuls cf wild- 
hyacinth or blue-Loll, jellow archangel or weaat-l- 
snout, bugle, cuokoo-flower, greater stitch-wort, violet, 
&c, and Bweet woodruff. Of this last Anne Pratt 
6ays : _" Dr. Wallich seys that its flowers, infused 
in water, make a tea tar superior to the Chinese 
teas." In Amersbam village I saw advertised two Dew 
Ccylnn teas— Palmyra aud Saltewatlie ! Close to the 
Railway at Wembley Park we saw that the rival to the 
Eiffel Tower had reached its first stage. 
The only indication that I have as yet discovered as 
to Shakespeare drinking Tea is in Julius Caesar, Act I 
Sec. III., where Cassius says— evidently rtf erring to 
Tea-leaves and Etna— "Why you shall find that 
heaven hath infused them with these spirits." No 
doubt I shall find many more such references. 
A. M. Ferguson. 
Replies -.—(23,579) Gems (to Ceylon").— Beryl is the 
name of a family of mineral crystals, otherwise named 
in several varieties, according to colour, as under, and 
they are all the same stone : — Transparent and bluish 
(beryl) are the most numerous, not very highly va'u- 
able ; sea-green (aquamarine), if large, are of consider- 
able valne ; deep-green (the emerald) are very valuable, 
some priceless. No red ones are known,— Emeeald 
Isle. — Ibid. 
COFFEE AND CACAO IN JAVA. 
The report of the Company Wonomerto mentions 
that the coffee cultivation suffered much from in- 
sects, but the cocoa cultivation has a more favour- 
able prespect, and will therefore be extended. The 
balance-sheet was approved, but no profit audioes 
account oan be produced as yet. A proposal to 
issue a 6 per cent bonded loan was adopted. The 
Deli-Batavia Company will pay 10 per cent, and 
the Senembah Company 6 4-10 per cent dividend. — 
L, and C. Express, 
