226 
TEMPLE. 
there can be no doubt would have arrived thus at their places of 
destination. 
Whether the leaves of many other plants would not attain the 
same quality as the tea, if submitted to the same process, is at 
least doubtful. Du Halde has remarked, that all the plants called 
Cha or Tea by the Chinese, are not to be considered as the tea 
plant ; and states, that a vegetable preparation sold in Shan-tung 
as very superior tea, is only a species of moss common to the 
mountains of that province. That the Chinese drink an infusion 
of ferns as tea is certain, as these plants were sold for the ex- 
press purpose at Nan-chang-foo on the Po-yang lake. I cannot 
help suspecting that they employ the leaves of the Camellia in 
the same way. This plant bears the same name as the tea with 
the Chinese, and resembles it in most of its botanical characters, 
grows with it in the same district, and is I suspect cultivated in the 
same manner : the seeds of both produce oil. Kaemfer informs us, that 
a species of Camellia is used in Japan to give a high flavour to tea. 
Whatever observations I have made relative to the probability of 
the successful cultivation of the tea plant, equally applies to the 
Camellia oleifera, or oil plant. I cannot but believe, from what I 
have observed of the soil and climate of St. Helena, that many 
of its present barren hills might be covered with this elegant and 
valuable shrub. 
The time unoccupied by the Embassy in visiting the streets of 
Canton and the neighbouring gardens, was in some measure spent 
in exploring the intricacies of the temple in which they resided, and 
in witnessing the religious rites of the bonzes. It was only during 
our residence at Canton that we had any opportunity of seeing these 
on a great scale. 
The large religious establishment, of which we inhabited a part, to 
the exclusion of numberless deities, almost equalled a town in extent. 
Temples with dormitories annexed and other buildings for the 
accommodation of bonzes, and ornamented exteriorly with all the 
