April 2, IfOO.] THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
669 
THE TEA CAMPAIGN IN AMERICA 
AND THE CONTINENT. 
From the long let ter of a London merchant 
closely connected with the Indian tea trade, 
we quote largely as follows and also 
give our reply to the same : — 
Since I was in Colombo four years ago, I have 
had the Weekly Observer regulaily, and came to 
the conclusion long ago that it would be a good 
tiling for both of us to meet. I have always 
recognized the iionest and good tone of your paper, 
in contrast to tliat of some special subject papers, 
the desire of which seems to be always to conceal 
the truth and write only what is likely to be palat- 
able to their readei s. There were a great many 
things in your letter of 6tli October (published 
in your paper of 26th) which I should have liked 
to discuss with yon, but which it is most difficult 
to deal with in corresi)ondence without being 
tediously long. 
TEA DUTY AND CONSUMPTION. 
Now to take up your tri-lingual paper on Ceylon 
Tea. It will no doubt have some effect if it 
gets a good circulation, especially in German- 
speaking communities and in Russia. I do not 
quite agree with your argument that the in- 
creased consumption of Tea in the United 
Kingdom arises from the reduction of the duty, — 
at least so far as relates to the adoption of a 
uniform duty of 6d per lb. on 1st June 1865, after- 
wards reduced to 4d per lb. on 1st May 1890. 
There has no doubt been a very material increase 
in the consumption, but it has been a uniform and 
steady one practically throughout this century, 
and to my mind the increase has arisen very 
largely because of the higher and more ex- 
travagant scale of living which the last 
half -century has brought about. Tea .50 
years ago was to a great extent a 
luxury of the rich ; today it is a necessary of 
the poor. Then a very material point in the 
question of increased consumption is the fact that 
not only has the first cost been reduced, but 
the distributive costs and profits have gra- 
dually been materially cut into, and conse- 
quently the retail selling prices are remarkably 
low, in fact, they are so low that I do not believe 
the abolition of the existing duty would have a 
great effect in giving a further stimulus to con- 
sumption, although of course, if the price were 
lower there would probably Ije a great deal of 
waste. I look upon the average consumption 
per head of the" population as having now nearly 
reached its possible maximum, because an 
average allowance of 6 lb. per annum amounts 
to a great deal in the liquid equivalent. I con- 
sider that the higher average shown by the Aus- 
tralian and New Zealand Colonies does not mean 
more liquid tea. A great part of it goes in waste 
because of the rough-and-ready way of the 
colonial and because of the method of making. 
Besides, in those Colonies the consumption is 
almost entirely the lowest class of tea which can 
be got from China. India or Ceylon, the liquid 
equivalent from which is often not more than half 
what the Irish people get from high-class Indian 
Broken Pekoes, which do not cost double the price 
l)er lb. In proof of my argument that the increased 
use of tea in this country arises largely from the 
more extravagant living of all classes, I would 
refer you to the increase in the consumption of 
nearly all those goods which pass through a general 
grocer and provision dealer-'s stock, also of butcher 
meat. 
Now as to forcing Tea on countries where it 
is not consumed at present. 1 am always amazed 
at the calmness and tlie confidence of many of 
your planters in regard to such things. I should 
say that if you took an average citizen of Euro|ie 
who had never tasted beer, wine, spirits, tea 
or coffee, and experimented upon liira, he would 
in all probaliility pronounce tea to be the most 
nauseous of them all. I'he more I travel among 
foreign peoples, tlie more I am convinced of the 
fact that the use of tea is very much iticieed a 
matter of acquired taste. Children are gradually 
br-'Uglit up to it and g.:t to like it, but it is 
very difficult to convert adults from another 
beverage. You doulille-s have seen in Italy the 
■ery infant at the breast being offered a sip of 
the sour wine of the country, and in Germany 
Ihe tiny children d- inking tiieit lager beer with 
their parents, while in Russia you see them in 
family groups round the samovar. It scenis to 
me somewhat like trying to stop Niagara to 
attempt to convert whoio cations from the customs 
of centuries and a great deal of harm has been 
done in Ceylon and India by overproduction of 
tea, based on the idea that because the United 
States of America contain 90 million people 
(roughly presumed to be Anglo-Saxon, butic;iily 
a nondescript horde representing all the nations 
and ways of living of Europe) there was a re- 
serve ground of consumption there wliicii in time 
might be expected to equal that of Great Britain. 
During the last 10 years I have over and over 
again protested against the use of the parrot- 
cry " Capture the American market," on the 
ground that there was no American market of 
material consequence. To be:;;in with, the people 
of the United States are co£Ft e-tlrinkers wherever 
they use hot liquid baverages^ A certain pro. 
portion are drinkers of tlie pale, tliin, pungent 
Green Teas of Formosa and Japan, while only 
a small proportion (principally immigrants from 
this side, or their descendants) are drinkers of 
Black Tea. Ihe only miirket for us to capture 
was this Black Tea market, and we have been 
getting it all the time by the displacement of 
China Tea. It ha? come to us in a natural way, 
firstly by the constant inferiority of the China 
production, and secondly by the serious fall in 
the cost of Indian and Ceylon Teas, which have 
gone down to a level that China cannot compete 
with, in fact, the fall in prices has done far more 
for us in North America. \a. Rus-ia and in Persia, 
than all our efforts of special missionaries and 
commissioners. The latter have too often only 
disturbed and interfered with the ordinary course 
of trade in the usual channels. 
"I do not think we can ever make much headway 
in any of the Latin countries or in any of the Green 
lea-nsing'i districts, or in Germany and Austro- 
Hungary, but I lia'^e no doubt that we can make 
good progress in all the higher latitudes of Europe, 
particularly in Russia. As to Russia, it seems to 
nie the most gross presumptio.i on the part of 
some of your people to suggest to the Govern- 
ment of that Empire the reduction or the 
abolition of duty. It is merely a revenue 
duty, not a protective one (except in so 
far as encouragement is given to Russian vessels 
and to the development of certain new trade 
routes) and if we can get our Tea in on the 
same terms as the ordinary China Tea, 1 hav« 
no doubt whatever that we will gradually over- 
