284 
THF TROPICAL AGRIGULTURSST. 
[October i, 1896 
bag, steamed for a few moments so as to cause it to ad- 
here ; it is then turned into wooden moulds, where it is 
beaten to the required consistency by means of wooden 
mallets. 
In the modern steam manufactories of Hankow, 
the dry dust is poured into iron moulds and there 
subjected to “steaming” and pressure. This gives a 
better shaped and firmer brick, and as the Siberians 
set great value on the appearance of their tea-blocks, 
looking especially to the sharp cut of the corners and 
sides, the modern-made article is preferred to the 
old-fashioned hand-moulded slab. When ready, the 
bricks are placed on one side to cool, stored in dry- 
ing rooms for a week, carefully wrapped in separate 
papers and packed in bamboo baskets, each contain- 
ing 64. Bach brick must weigh one catty — 1| lb. that 
is — and great care must be exercised to secure the 
desired weight, or the Siberians and Tartars will re- 
fuse them. Hence, a brick, if underweight, is rejected 
and afterwards remade. Green tea is prepared in ex- 
actly the same way, only that the prejudices of the 
buyers require it to be made up into 2§ lb. tablets, 
to be made of the whole leaf and not the dust, and 
to be packed 36 in a basket. The cost of preparation, 
carriage, duty, and packing is about 30a per “picul’’ 
of 133 lb., or about 2|d per ib. Hence it can be sold 
at a very low price in the Siberian and Eussian markets 
for which it is manufactured. The makers being 
practical business men, have due regard for the pre- 
judices of their customers in favour of a brick of nice 
appearance, so they take care to reserve the finer and 
beet quality dust for the outside facing, keeping the 
coarser and inferior leaf for the inside core. Some 
years ago this kind of brick tea was shipped to London 
in large quantities for despatch to Kussia. At pre 
sent it all goes direct from Ohina overland via Kiakhta 
and Maimachin. 
The better class of Siberians and Mongols require 
a superior article, and to supply their wants a 
smaller brick or tablet of a good quality leaf is pre- 
pared. It is manufactured from the finest tea dust 
procurable from Ning-chow in Kiang-si, and Tsung- 
yang and Yanglutung in Hu-peh. The selection is 
carefully made, only the product of the early pickings 
or first crop being chosen. The fine leaf is not steamed 
for steaming has a serious drawback, inasmuch 
as it robs the tea of all its fragrance, and would 
therefore ill adapt the hricks for connoisseurs. The 
dust is poured into steel moulds, quite dry, and sub- 
jected to hydraulic pressure of about two tons on the 
square inch. In this way the tea is found to preserve 
for an indefinite period all its aroma and freshness. 
But not alone is the leaf used for the.small, tablets rather 
expensive, but the cost of manufacture is high owing 
to the care requisite for the proper preparation of the 
slabs. The original cost to the manufacturer at Han- 
kow is over 84s per picul. Duty, carriage, packing, 
and so forth, will amount to at least as much in ad- 
dition, so that the tablets can hardly be sold at a 
profit to the wholesale dealer and retailed at much 
under 4s per lb. With the best steam machinery tbe 
“ failures” are over 5 per cent., where the old-fashioned 
hand moulds are used 25 per cent, of the bricks turned 
out are imperfect and have to be remade. It is 
claimed for the compressed tablets and bricks that the 
fragrant constituents of the leaf are better preserved 
than in the ordinary loose state, that the cells are 
broken by the heavy hydraulic pressure to which they 
are subjected, hence the use of the bricks is more 
economical, a given weight yielding a stronger infusion 
than the same quantity of loose tea. But though the 
small tablets have been introduced in this country, 
they have not taken with English tea drinkers. 
The true brick tea of China, the unsophisticated 
native article, is, however, nothing like the tablets and 
slabs above mentioned which find their way to Eussia 
and Siberia. The genuine brick tea of the Chinese 
manufacturers is that which is intended for the Thibe- 
tan market and for the Eastern Mongols, It is made of 
the whole leaf, stalk, flower, and all, as it is picked from 
ihe tea shrub, and is in shape and appearance not unlike 
a rather dirty ordinary brick. Tho correspondent writing 
,n the Keio Omknii JJulletin states that he has never 
seen this kind of brick tea manufactured, but knows 
“ it is made by Chinese in a very simple way,” Simple 
is hardly the word to apply to the process of brick tea 
making adopted by the natives. Primitive is. perhaps, 
nearer the mark. The leaves are chewed, and when 
well saturated with saliva are laid out to ferment and 
partially dry. They are then rolled up into little balls, 
with the help of some additional moisture, and after- 
wards moulded by hand into oblong blocks or bricks 
about 10 in. long, 10 in. broad, and about 4 in. 
thick. The leaves thus prepared acquire a slightly 
sour taste, due to the fermentation induced by the 
saliva* which the Thibetans appear to like. The trade 
in these bricks is a most important one, and it is the 
fear of interference with it on the part of the tea- 
growers of Assam that is at the bottom of a good deal 
of the hostility manifested by the Chinese and Thibe- 
tans to an attempt to enter into closer com- 
mercial relations with the Trans-Himalayan State. 
The trade in brick tea is a strict monopoly of 
the Lamas or priestly caste of Thibet, and they 
are very jealous of any interference with what is to 
them a highly profitable business. The ordinary Thi- 
betan must have tea ; it is the one thing he considers 
indispensable, and cannot live without, and for this 
commodity he depends entirely upon the Lamas. The 
latter know that if intercourse between Darjeeling and 
Thibet were encouraged, the Assam planters could, 
and would, supply the natives with tea at a much 
lower rate than the priests charge. So what with the 
Lamas on the one hand, who fear to lose the monopoly 
they now enjoy, and the Chinese planters on the other 
side, who are afraid of losing the Thibetan market, it 
is not altogether surprising that the attempt to foster 
commercial intercourse between India and Bodyul is 
not viewed with favour on the other side of the Indo- 
Chinese frontier. Brick tea is also used as currency in 
Thibet, prices being quoted in equivalents of the com- 
pressed leaf. The beverage prepared from the sourish 
tablets is hardly likely to tempt the Western palate. 
The Thibetan teapot is a sort of wooden churn into 
which a boiling infusion of the tea-leaves is poured 
through a strainer ; a little salt is added, and some 
20 or 30 strokes are applied with a wooden dasher 
pierced with a number of holes. A lump or two of but- 
ter is then thrown in, and the mixture churned with 
100 or 150 strokes “ administered with much preci- 
sion.” But this is a good dtal more palatable to Euro- 
peans than the brew concocted of the bricks by the 
neighbouring Mongols. Meal, as well as a bountiful 
supply of butter, is added to the decoction, and with a 
fat sheep’s tail or two swimming about in the liquid, a 
dish of tea is served out which, in flavour and appear- 
ance, it is difficult to distinguish from well-thickened 
pea-soup . — Morning Post. 
PERAK AS A FIELD FOR PLAKTIKG 
ENTEEPEIZE. 
We have pleasure in giving publicity to the follow- 
ing extracts from a letter addressed by the Su- 
perintendent. Government Plantations, Perak, to a 
European firm in Penang ; — 
“ A short report on the soil and climate of Perak, 
and on the suitablity of the country for tea and other 
tropical products, is the best answer X can make to 
the last para of your letter. 
...A glance at the map of the Malay Peninsula and 
Archipelago will show, better than words of mine 
can describe, how admirably Perak is situated. It is 
practically in the same latitude with, and may be 
said to be the centre of, the richest Spanish, Dutch, and 
English Oolonies, which have been famous for centuries. 
In most parts of the country — more particularly the 
Perak Valley (a magnificent tract of laud of vast 
extent), the Kinta and Batang Padang Valleys, the 
Valley of the Slim and the country stretching from 
the British Province Wellesley to Taipeng, embracing 
the Krian and Selama districts — the soil is a deep 
rich loam, and in places where limestone mountains 
crop up, is truly unrivalled for productiveness. 
liainj'all and, Temperature,— Of&oisX returns give the 
mean rainfall at seven stations, occupying cent 
