Nov.  r,  1892.] 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
331 
TEA  IN  ITS  PRIME  IN  CHINA,  AND  THE 
FIRST  BEGINNINGS  OF  THE  TEA  ENTER- 
PRISE IN  INDIA  IN  1848- 51. 
These  are  the  principal  topics  dealt  with  in  a 
second  oharming  book  by  Robert  Fortune,  author 
of  “ Wanderings  in  China.”  On  the  first  occa- 
sion Fortune  visited  China  as  a plant  collector 
or  a great  English  firm  of  florists.  On  the 
seoond  journey,  while  devoting  speoial  attention 
to  his  special  mission  of  obtaining  seeds  and 
plants  of  “ the  best  teas  of  China,”  for  his  em- 
ployers, the  then  puissant  “ Hon.  East  India 
Company,”  he  did  not  negleot  the  collection  of 
other  rare  and  beautiful  plants  in  which  China 
abounds  ; and  few  men  have  enriohed  his  native 
oountry  and  the  world  outside  China  with  so 
many  botanioal,  horticultural  and  floral  treasures 
as  did  this  accomplished  writer,  enterprising  traveller 
and  conscientiously  careful  observer.  His  enthusi- 
asm in  connection  with  each  find  of  rare  and 
beautiful  trees,  plants  and  flowers  is  delightful  to 
read  about  and  oontagious  in  its  effect.  As  re- 
gards tea  he  was  the  first  to  dissipate  the  popular 
idea  that  green  and  black  teas  were  made  from 
distinct  speoies  of  plants,  Then  viridis  and  Boliea  ; 
and  he  came  to  India  in  1851,  with  his  four  years’ 
experience  and  observation  in  China,  just  in  time 
to  prevent  the  young  enterprise  ending  in  failure 
instead  of  the  grand  sucoess  which  it  has  aohieved 
from  the  absurd  idea  whioh  prevailed  amongst 
Indian  authorities  that  tea  required  the  same 
culture  by  irrigation  which  was  applied  to  rice  ! 
On  many  of  the  experimental  plantations  on  the 
slopes  and  in  the  valleys  of  the  Himalayas  he 
found  the  tea  plants  sickly,  dying  and  dead  from 
water-logging  and  being  grown  on  flat,  undrained 
land.  The  most  successful  plants  were  grown  where 
means  of  irrigation  were  most  deficient.  He  was 
sent  to  China  to  colleot  the  very  best  tea  plants  ; 
and  he  succeeded  in  finding  them  on  the  lower 
slopes  of  the  higher  mountain  ranges  of  China, 
between  25°  and  31°  North,  the  best  of  all  growing 
between  27°  and  30°,  where  not  only  was  the 
soil  good,  but  the  natural  drainage  was  perfect.  The 
very  frontispiece  to  his  book  “ Visit  to  the  Tea 
Districts  of  India  and  China  ” is  reassuring  to 
tea  planters  in  Ceylon  whose  estates  are  on  the 
slopes  of  high  and  precipitous  mountains.  The  grand 
difference  between  the  Ceylon  mountain  plants, 
tions  and  those  of  China  and  we  may  add  of 
India, — the  Himalayas  and  the  Nilgiris, — is,  that, 
whereas  in  China  and  India  the  summits  of  the 
mountains  are  generally  barren  from  the  wash  of 
soil  downwards,  a large  proportion  of  our  hill 
ranges  are  not  only  cultivable  to  the  summi's,  but 
in  some  cases  have  the  riohest  soil  on  the  highest 
altitudes.  Even  the  “ lowcountry  ” tea  estates  of 
Ceylon  are  generally  on  steep  although  not  lofty 
knolls,  with  undulations  in  all  cases  sufficient  to 
seoure  perfect  drainage  into  rivers  and  streams  below. 
Besides  good  soil  and  drainage  (a  yellow-ooloured 
somewhat  stiffish  clay  if  well  mixed  with  humus, 
being  appreciated),  Mr.  Fortune  indicated  condi- 
tions of  climate— temperature  and  rainfall— which 
are  well  fulfilled  in  Ceylon,  except  that  cold,  down 
as  low  as  40°,  32°  and  even  28°,  is  utterly  absent 
from  our  lowoountry  plantations  in  Ceylon.  Per- 
haps this  absenoe  of  cold  alternating  with  tropioal 
heat  aaoounts  for  some  absenoe  of  the  delioate 
flavour  in  the  lowoountry  teas  which  distinguishes 
those  grown  up  to  5,000-6,000  and  even  7,000 
feet  altitude,  the  compensatory  advantages  in  the 
former  oase  being  luxuriant  growth  and  strength 
of  produot.  But  Robert  Fortune,  writing  in  the 
first  year  of  “the  fifties,”  while  recognizing  the 
faot  that  the  tea  plant  could  be  grown  (although 
not  in  a commercially  profitable  soale)  in  Britain, 
America  and  Australia,  seems  to  have  as  little 
appreciated  the  idea  of  Ceylon  growing  tea  as  of 
India  availing  herself  of  her  indigenous  product, 
whioh  was  ultimately  found  to  be  superior,  not 
only  to  the  inferior  China  plants  first  imported, 
but  to  the  very  best,  carried  with  such  care  and 
suocess  to  India  from  “ the  Bohea  mountains  ” of 
China  to  India  by  himself.  The  now  varying  “jats" 
of  tea  existing  in  India  and  Ceylon,  from  indigenous 
large-leaved  Assam,  to  the  most  minute-leaved 
China  variety,  with  all  possible  sizes  and  qualities 
between,  must  be  attributed  to  the  bringing  back 
to  India  of  its  own  degenerated  tea  from  China 
and  the  resulting  hybridization  or  mixture  whioh 
ensued.  But  Robert  Fortune  well  performed  his 
duty;  and  we  have  more  than  once  expressed  our 
disagreement  with  Col.  Money  and  other  writers 
who  regard  the  introduction  of  China  tea  to  India 
in  the  time  of  Lord  William  Bentinok  and  his 
successors  as  an  unqualified  evil.  We  believe,  on 
the  oontrary,  that  the  results  have  been  the  pro- 
duction of  hybrids  better  suited  for  oulture,  espeoi- 
ally  on  estates  of  high  altitude,  than  either  the 
original  Assam  or  its  denegerate,  or  at  any  rate 
diminutive,  offspring  in  China  would  have  been. 
Although  Mr.  Fortune,  very  strangely,  never  re- 
ferred to  the  indigenous  tea  of  Assam  as  preferable 
or  even  equal  to  the  China  plant,  and  although, 
naturally  enough,  with  his  prepossessions  as  to 
altitude  and  latitude,  he  did  not  anticipate  the 
growth  of  tea  on  a commercial  scale  in  Ceylon,  he 
indulged  in  anticipations  regarding  the  use  of  tea 
as  a beverage  by  the  natives  of  India,  and  of  bene- 
fits resulting  to  them  from  the  practice  suoh  as 
the  people  of  the  tea  districts  of  China  enjoy, 
whioh,  unhappily,  have  not  been  fulfilled  and  whioh 
are  not  likely  to  be  fulfilled  unless  the  small  farmers 
of  certain  portions  of  India  themselves  take  to 
growing  and  preparing  tea  for  household  use.  It 
seems  to  us  that  it  would  be  almost  impossible  to 
exar . rate  the  benefits  whioh  the  wretohed  rayats 
of  India  would  derive  from  the  general  use  of 
a warm,  cheering  and,  we  insist,  nutritious  diet 
euch  as  tea  is.  Tea  is  the  real  “ staff  of  life’’ 
of  millions  of  Chinese, — millions  who  are 
poorer  even  than  the  depressed  because  (largely) 
improvident  and  debt-encumbered  labouring 
classes  of  India.  We  are  glad,  therefore,  to 
believe  that  amongst  the  natives  of  Ceylon  the 
use  of  tea  as  a beverage  is  increasing  to  a very 
encouraging  degree.  If  only  the  300  millions  of 
India  oonsumed  even  a few  ounces  per  caput,  per 
annum,  the  additional  demand  and  additional 
market  would  be  far  more  important  than  America, 
Russia  and  the  nations  of  Continental  Europe  oan 
be  for  many  long  years  to  come.  The  accounts 
which  Fortune  and  all  succeeding  writers  give  of 
the  almost  incredible  poverty  of  the  masses  in 
China,  many  of  whom  live  on  2§d  or  even  2d  per 
diem,  awakenB  our  sympathy  for  the  classes  of 
Chinese  who  are  thrown  out  of  employment  as 
artizans  (box-makers)  and  transport  ooolies  by 
the  lessened  foreign  demand  for  China  teas.  Mr. 
Fortune  describes  in  a most  graphio  manner  the 
long  rows  of  coolies  he  encountered  on  some  of  the 
mountain  passes  and  paths,  carrying  boxes  of  tea 
whioh  had  to  perform  24  or  26  days’  journey 
before  reaching  their  destination ! The  inferior 
teas  were  oarried,  two  boxes  to  a oooly,  one  box 
at  eaoh  end  of  a bamboo  “ pingo.”  These  boxes 
were  thrown  on  the  ground  at  every  rest  taken 
by  the  ooolies,  and  were  thus  greatly  injured,  as 
was  the  quality  of  their  oontents.  The  finer  teas 
were  oarried  on  an  arrangement  of  bamboos,  whioh 
prevented  the  boxes’  ever  touohing  the  earth.  In 
this  oase  there  was  only  one  for  eaoh  oooly,  the 
