April  i,  1397.]  THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
679 
rous  v)roclact3— “ pliloroglucin  ” and  “ paia-tU-liy- 
droxybenzene,”  and  many  otlier  sneeze-words 
whicli  your  correspondeiifc  ojnfesses,  lie  does  not 
know  iiow  to  spell.  Indian  and  Ceylon  teas, 
it  was  explaineil  later  on,  posse.ss  more  of 
both  tannin  and  tbeine  than  China  teas,  but 
it  would  be  wrong  to  infer  from  that  fact  tiiat 
the  consumer  imbibed  more  tannin  ami  theine 
with  a cup  of  British-grown  tea,  for  a larger  quan- 
tity of  China  tea  had  to  be  pub  into  the  pot. 
China  tea,  said  Mr.  Crole,  was  lowest  in  theine, 
Japanese  had  a little  more,  and  then  came  Java, 
Ceylon  and  Indian  (in  the  order  mentioned). 
Sir  E.  Stewart  Bayley  presided,  and  amo;ig  the 
audience  were  Mr.  (f.  W.  Chrisbison  and  Mr. 
A.  (4.  Stanton.  Though  the  tone  of  the  lecture 
was  severely  scientillc,  a lively  contributor  to 
the  Daily  feleyroph  manages  to  weave  plenty 
of  fun  into  a half-column  report  of  the  meet- 
ing. After  ronqiing  about  among  the  poets 
wlio  have  made  verses  out  of  tea,  he  winds  up 
with  the  remark  that  it  is  bad  enough  to  be 
frightened  with  “ There  is  death  in  the  pot”, 
but  it  is  worse  to  be  intimidated  with  “ There 
is  ‘ cheesine.ss  ’ in  the  chest  ” — from  which  it 
will  be  inferred  that  the  lecturer  had  some- 
thing to  say  as  to  the  advantage  of  steel  tea 
chests. 
Among  new  Conqianies  floated  this  week  is 
THE  CEYLON  PROPltlETARY  TEA  ESTATES  COM- 
PANY, LD., 
with  a share  capital  of  £160,000,  divided  into 
40,000  £5  per  cent  cumulated  preference  shares  of 
£1  each,  and  120,000  ordinary  of  £1  ; 150  £5  per 
cent  first  mortgage  debentures  of  £100  each  have 
already  been  subscribed  for.  The  directors  are 
Mr.  H.  K.  Rutherford,  Mr.  G.  A.  Talbot,  Mr.  R. 
A.  Cameron  and  Mr.  F.  H.  Wiggin  (late  Chair- 
man, Beaumont  Tea  Company  of  Ceylon).  Sir  Wm. 
Johnston,  Bart.,  is  the  Secretary.  “ The  Company 
is  formed,”  says  the  prospectus,  “ with  the  object 
primarily  of  acquiring  as  going  concerns  tl*e  follow- 
ing tea  estates  in  Ceylon  : the  Beaumont  Group 
(Pusselawa  District),  the  Forres  and  Warburton 
estates  (Maskeliya),  the  Summerville  estate 
(Dikoya),  the  Troy  estate  (Kelani),  the  Radella 
estate,  se^’ell-eighth  shares  (I)imbula).  It  is 
estimated  the  2,113  acres  under  tea  will  yield 
at  the  rate  of  400  lb.  per  acre,  or  845,000  lb. 
per  annum,  when  all  the  acreage  is  in  bear- 
ing. This,  at  3J  per  lb.  profit,  will  give  a 
return  of  .£11,000  per  annum,  wdiicli  is  suffi- 
cient to  pay  the  debenture  and  preference  in- 
terest  and  a good  dividend  on  the  ordinary 
capital.”  The  price  to  be  paid  to  the  vendors 
for  the  properties  (subject  as  to  the  Beaumont 
Group,  Forres  and  Warburton  to  £15,000  de- 
bentures or  Beaumont  Tea  Coy.  of  Ceylon,  Ld.) 
is  £95,480,  payable  £71,376  in  shares  and 
£24,104  in  cash. 
CLUB  ECHOES  AND  TEA  LEAVES. 
(By  an  ex-UjJCounfry  Resident.) 
London,  February  12. 
Last  night,  having  failed  to  get  a seat  at 
Nansen’s  great  meeting  the  evening  before,  I con- 
soled myself  with  attending  a lecture  delivered 
at  the  Society  of  Arts,  John  street,  by  Mr.  Davhl 
Crole.  The  subject  was 
the'  CIIE.MISTRY  OF  TEA, 
and  I have  no  doubt  whatever  that  the  lecturer 
himself  understood  all  the  jaw-breaking  words 
and  technical  terms  he  used  in  the  course  of  his 
address,  but  honesty  compels  me  to  admit  they 
were  f.ar  beyond  me.  I .am  the  less  .ash.amed  of 
this  conlession,  humiliating  as  it  m.ay  appear, 
because  at  the  close  of  the  lecture  one  old 
planting  hand  after  another  stood  up  to  .acknow- 
ledge the  same  identical  thing.  The  very  Chair- 
man— a K. C.S.  I.  no  lc.ss — confessed  himself 
battled,  and  one  e.xperienced  tea  planter,  whom  I 
met  afterwards,  succinctly  expres.sed  the  perfor- 
mance as  the  “ most  awful  heathenish  jargon  ” he 
had  ever  heard  in  all  his  days.  The  Latin  in- 
.scription  which  Littleton  of  dictionary  fame,  com- 
posed for  the  Monument  and  which  included  the 
names  of  seven  Lord  Mayors  in  one  word,  was 
nothing  to  it.  This  was  all  the  more  to  be 
regretted  that  Mr.  Crole  has  evidently  accumu- 
lated a vast  amount  of  scientific  information  on 
the  subject.  In  fact  what  this  distinguished 
specialist  does  not  know  about  tea,  I should  say 
is  not  much  worth  knowing,  and  if  he  had  only 
had  a little  mercy  on  the  less  highly  trained 
brains  of  his  audience,  all  would  haVe  been  well. 
A lecturer  at  any  subject  must  cultivate  a popular 
style  if  he  wishes  to  be  enjoyed  by  the  man 
in  the  street. 
But  enough  of  criticism.  Passing  over  the 
purely  technical  part  of  Mr.  Crole’s  remarks,  the 
outcome  of  his  lecture  was  pretty  much  as  fol- 
lows : He  altogether  deprecated  the  rule  of  thumb 
system  in  tea  planting  and  advocated  more 
general  attention  to  the  scientific  side  of  the 
mattei.  iVIuch,  he  said,  has  yet  to  be  discovered 
about  what  goes  on  in  plant-life,  and  therefore 
details,  which  might  be  useful  to  the  tea  planter 
are  as  yet  lost  to  him.  (A  table  of  analysis 
which  Mr.  Crole  had  borrowed  from  his  own  text- 
book on  the  subject  of  tea  hung  on  the  wall 
behind  the  lecturer  and  was  frequently  refer- 
red to.  The  list  of  subst.-uices  displayed  on 
it  was  truly  formidable  to  an  unscientific 
mind  !)  Bohea  tannic  acid,  the  chief  form  of 
tannic  found  in  black  tea  b. dongs,  the  lecturer 
said,  \.o  t\iQ  non-qvecniny  variety,  “tea”  tannic 
the  characteristic  form  of  the  acid  in  green  tea 
on  the  other  hand  being  of  the  non-blueing  class. 
When  tea  liquor  remains  in  contact  with  the 
air  for  some  days,  the  cloudine-ss  that  is  ap- 
parent i.s  line  to  a xeaction  between  the  tannic 
acid  and  the  legumin,  and  the  consequent  for- 
mation of  an  obscure  and  insoluble  compound, 
the  astringency  being  ilecreased  to  a marked 
extent.  This  reaction  accounts  somewhat  for  the 
“ mellowing  ” of  tea  that  is  kept  for  a time. 
Teas  freshly  rnanufactureil  produce  unpleasant 
symptoms  when  drunk,  therefore  they  should  be 
mellowed  for  at  least  si.x  months.  Thickness  of 
liquor  or  creaming , that  quality  so  hi<dily 
esteemed  by  tea  tasters  and  buyers  depends  01° the 
amount  of  mucilage  present  in  the  tea,  and  also 
in  the  action  of  tannin  on  theine.  The  amount 
of  essential  oil,  theot  in  tea  is  variable,  but  it 
is  a very  important  constituent,  as  its  presence 
determines  the  greater  part  of  the  flavour  aroma 
Being  volatile  it  is  apt  to  be  lost  if  the  tea  i.s 
exposed  too  long  to  the  air.  It  is  developed 
during  the  process  of  withering,  and  in  the  first 
stage  of  firing,  but  irrational  firing  may  drive  off 
a good  deal  of  it  by  the  steam  generated  in  the 
firing.  If  projier  attention,  said  Mr.  Crole,  were 
given  to  this  part  of  the  subject,  he  had  no 
doubt  the  percentage  of  essential  oil  in  tea  mifdit 
be  greatly  increased,  and  the  quality  of  the  'tea 
consequently  improved.  It  could  be  extracted 
from  refuse  tea,  etc.  by  distillation  by  steam 
but  the  great  barrier  is  the  seeming  impo,ssibility 
in  keeping  it,  as  it  so  readily  resiiiizes  in  contact 
with  the  air.  Tlie  more  re.siii,  the  le.ss  essential 
