586 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
[March  x,  1893. 
not  a similar  custom  prevail  in  the  last  century 
iooV‘  >K°tes  aud  Gwenes,  0th  S.,  iv.,  July  16th, 
Tool,  p,  4u.) 
I shall  be  glad  to  see  what  date  may  be  fixed  by 
a general  consensus.  My  date  would  be  1848-9,  mv 
place  the  house  of  the  then  Lieutenant-Governor  of 
Sandhurst ; but  the  practice  of  having  “afternoon 
tea  soon  became  very  general,  and  then,  one  may 
say,  universal.— Gibbes  Rigaud,  18  Long  Wall,  Oxford. 
1 remember  very  well  the  first  time  I saw  afternoon 
tea  brought  in.  There  was  a small  archery  party 
croquet  had  not  then  been  introduced.  About  five 
o clock  the  butler  came  to  us  and  said:  “If  you 
please,  my  lady  the  servants  are  going  to  have  tea. 
if  you  would  like  to  have  some.  The  weather  was 
hot,  and  tea  was  brought  out.  After  this  the  practice 
became  a regular  one  at  the  house,  and  I suppose  at 
other  houses  also.  This  was  somewhere  between  1845 
and  1850. — E.  Leaton  Blenkinsopp. 
Sixty  years  ago  it  was  common  in  Roxburgh- 
shire for  the  wives  to  take  tea  in  the  afternoon 
lour  hours  after  their  mid-day  dinner.  Owing  t'-  , 
interval  the  tea  taking  got  the  name  of  “ four  ’ this 
C.  {Notes  and  Quarles,  6th  8., iv.,  Aug.  1 " _ nours.’' 
a.  1-ate  uumb?r  , of  Chamber'  x6  1881,  p.  136.) 
187o)  it  is  asserted  that  ,s  Journal  (Nov.  20, 
duct  of  advanced  _lCernoon  tea  is  a pro- 
being generally  - vilziation  this  little  meal 
vogue  during  supposed  to  have  first  come  into 
presume  o „ne  jas(.  decade  or  so  Like  many  other 
. novelties,  however,  it  is  merely  the  revival 
a custom  of  the  last  century.  Dr.  Alexander 
Carlyle,  in  his  Autobiography,  p.  434,  describing  the 
ashionable  mode  of  living  at  Harrogate,  in  1763, 
writes: — “ The  ladies  gave  afternoon’s  tea  and  coffee 
in  their  turns,  which,  coming  but  once  in  four  or 
five  weeks,  amounted  to  a trine." 
— H,  A.  Kennedy,  Junior,  United  Service  Club.  (Notes 
and  Queries,  5thS.,v.,  Feb.  19,  1876,  p.  145.) 
Tea  and  Scandal. — In  reading  Congreve's  “ Way  of 
the  World,”  lately,  I was  amused  to  find  how  soon  tea 
became  popularly  associated  with  scandal,  a partner- 
ship which  has,  I fancy,  not  even  yet  been  dissolved. 
Mirabell,  in  Act.  iv.  scene  1,  says  to  Mrs.  Millamant:  — 
“ Lastly,  to  the  dominion  of  the  tea  table  I submit, — 
but  with  proviso  that  you  exceed  not  in  your  pro- 
vince ; but  restrain  yourself  to  native  and  simple 
tea  table  drinks,  as  tea,  chocolate,  and  coffee : as 
likewise  to  genuine  and  authorised  tea  table  talk — 
such  as  mending  of  fashions,  spoiling  reputations, 
railing  at  absent  friends,  and  so  forth.’’  As  tea  was 
at  the  date  of  the  play  (1700),  comparatively  new,  and 
was  even  then  an  expensive  luxury,  it  would  seem  that 
there  must  be  a natural  sympathy  between  tea  and 
scandal.  Can  anyone  point  out  a still  earlier  allu- 
sion to  the  union  of  this  happy  pair?”  A friend,  to 
whom  I mentioned  the  above  passage,  asks  me,  “Why 
did  our  forefathers  invariably  speak  of  a dish  of  tea?” 
I suppose  there  was  no  reason  other  than  .sue  volebat 
usus  [so  usage  willed  it. — A.  M.  F.,  Jr.J.  when  did 
people  begin  to  speak  of  a cup  of  tea?  They  must 
have  begun  by  Cowper’s  time — “ the  cups  that  cheer 
but  not  inebriate, — in  ‘ The  Task,’  1785.  Did  our 
ancestors  ever  say  “a  dish  of  coffee”  ? Pope,  in  the 
“ Rape  of  the  Lock,”  Canto  iii.,  speaking  of  coffee, 
says,  “And  frequent  cups  prolong  the  rich  repast.”  A 
passing  character  in  “The  Way  of  the  World”  I,  2, 
orders  “ two  dishes  of  chocolate.”  The  Retired 
Citizen  in  the  317th  Spectator,  in  his  delightfully 
“fusionless”  diary,  notes  that  he  had  “a  dish  of 
Twist  ” at  the  Coffee-house,  what  was  this  ? There 
is  a coarse  tobacco  called  ‘Twist,”  but  did  our  fore- 
fathers at  any  period  speak  of  a dish  of  tobacco  ? 
The  French  as  a nation  are  not,  and  I suppose  never 
were,  great  tea-drinkers  ; and  yet  the  poet,  Jacques 
Delille  (ob.  1813),  who  seems  to  have  been  as  domestic 
in  his  tastes  and  habits  as  Cowper,  in  a passage  in 
his  poem  “Les  Trois  Regnes,”  quoted  in  Chapsal’s 
“ Modeles  de  Litterature  Framjaise,”  mentions  tea 
and  coffee  as  though  he  considered  them  entitled  to 
equal  honours  :— 
Mon  coeur  devient-il  triste  et  ma  tete  pdsante, 
Eh  bien  1 pour  rammer  ma  gaitd  languissante, 
La  feve  de  Moka,  la  feuille  de  Canton, 
Yont  verser  leur  nectar  dans  Ismail  de  Japon, 
Dans  ^1  airin  echauffe  deja  1’onde  frissonne, 
Bient6t  le  the  dore  jaunit  1’eau  qui  bouillonne 
Ou  des  grains  du  Levant  je  goute  le  parfum 
In  another  passage  Delille  breaks  out  into  absolute 
enthusiasm  over  coffee  : — 
C est  toi,  divin  cafe,  dont  1’aimable  liqueur, 
oans  alterer  la  tide,  epanouit  le  coeur 
Whether  this  couplet  was  written  before  or  after 
Ihe  lask,  I do  not  know.  It  is  curiously  like 
the  well-known  passage  I have  quoted  above.  Delille 
was  well  read  in  English  literature;  he  translated 
Paradise  Lost  and  the  “Essay  on  Man"  • X—  f 
may  be  merely  a coincidence.  Again 1 u 
Viensdonc,  divin  nectar,  viens  8'  ’ . 
Je  ne  veux  qu'un  dcse*“  -one,  lnspire-moi, 
We  must  remember  th-  ' Dlon  Antigone,  ettoi. 
that  inspired  th»-  -•*!  it  was  French-made  coffee 
English  coff-  -e  lines.  A single  cup  of  average 
siasrn  -oe  would  have  quenched  the  poet's  enthu- 
A'  effectually.— Jonathan  Bouchier,  Ropley, 
_,resford. 
P.S.— Since  writing  the  above  I have  met  with  ‘a 
dish  of  coffee'  in  Swift's  “Polite  Conversation.” 
Meg  Dods,  in  ‘St.  Ronan's  Well’  speaks  of  a dish 
of  tea’  more  than  once.  (Notes  and  Q.,  7th  S.,  vi., 
Oct.  13,  1888,  p.  282.) 
Mr.  Bouchier  asks  what  was  the  “ twist”  of  which 
the  retired  citizen  took  a dish.  Hotten's  Slang 
Dicty.  says  that  twist  is  gin  and  brandy  mixed.  In 
Pendennis,  vol.  ii.  chap.  i.  we  are  told  that  “gin- 
twist  and  devilled  turkey  had  no  charms”  for  Mrs. 
Harry  Fokes.  Mrs.  Mortimer  Collins,  in  ‘Frances,’ 
chap,  v.,  seeme  to  use  the  word  simply  as  a synonym 
for  ordinary  grog:  “As  Walter  Carey  smoked  his 
evening  pipe  over  his  evening  twist,  he  felt  perfectly 
satisfied.” — Geo.  L.  Apperson.  (Notes  and  Q.,  7th  S., 
vi.,  Dec.  22,  1888,  p.  498.) 
Hair  and  Tea. — It  is  commonly  believed  that  we 
English,  or  at  least  the  Mercian  part  of  us,  were 
once  a fair-haired  people,  but  that  for  some  reason 
the  hair  has  become  darker  each  succeeding  genera- 
tion for  a long  time  past.  I know  not  whether  this 
be  so,  nor  am  I able  to  suggest  any  means  of  set- 
tling the  question.  Assuming,  however,  that  an  in- 
creasing darkness  in  the  hair  be  proved,  I have  heard 
it  suggested  that  it  may  have  come  about  by  our 
habit  of  drinking  tea.  Tea  taken  in  large  quantities 
will,  says  a scientific  friend  of  mine,  darken  the 
complexion,  and  therefore  the  hair.  I should  like  to 
know  whether  this  be  mere  dreaming,  or  whether 
there  be  truth  therein. — A Mercian.  (Notes  and 
Quines,  5th  S.,  vii,,  April  28th,  1877.) 
Tea  — The  following  notice  of  tea  is  copied  from  the 
Delation  of  the  Voyage  to  Siam  by  Six  Jesuits  in  1685, 
London,  1688,  p.  269  : — “ It  is  a civility  amongst  them 
to  present  betel  and  tea  to  all  that  visit  them.  Their 
own  country  supplies  them  with  betel  and  areca,  but 
they  have  their  tea  from  China  and  Japan.  All  the 
orientals  have  a particular  esteem  for  it,  because  of 
the  great  virtues  they  find  to  be  in  it.  Their  physi- 
cians say  that  it  is  a sovereign  medicine  against 
the  stone  and  pains  in  the  head  that  it  allays 
vapours  : that  it  cheers  the  mind : and  streng- 
thens the  stomach.  In  all  kinds  of  fevers 
they  take  it  stronger  than  commonly,  when 
they  begin  to  feel  the  heat  of  the  fit,  and  then  the 
patient  covers  himsslf  up  to  sweat,  and  it  hath  been 
very  often  found  that  this  sweat  wholly  drives  away 
the  fever.  In  the  East  they  prepare  the  tea  in  this 
manner  : when  the  water  is  well-boiled,  they  pour  it 
upon  the  tea,  which  they  have  put  into  an  earthen 
pot,  proportionably  to  what  they  intend  to  take  (the 
ordinary  proportion  is  as  much  as  one  can  take  up 
with  the  finger  and  thumb  for  a pint  of  water),  then 
they  cover  the  pot  until  the  leaves  are  sunk  to  the 
bottom  of  it,  and  afterward  give  it  about  in  China 
dishes,  to  be  drank  as  hot  as  can  be  without  sugar, 
or  else  with  a little  sugar-candy  in  the  mouth  : and 
upon  that  tea  more  boiling  water  may  be  poured,  and 
so  it  may  be  made  to  serve  twice.  These  people  drink 
of  it  several  times  a day,  but  do  not  think  it  wholsome 
to  take  it  fasting.” — W.E.A.A.  (Notes  and  Queries, 
4th  S.,  vii.,  18th  Feb.  1871,  p.  139.) 
Sheffield  Expressions. — A curious  expression,  pre- 
vailing here,  is  the  use  of  the  word  “ gamest  ” as 
applying  to  the  most  direct  road  to  « plaoe.  A 
