214 Manner of the CHINESE drinking TEA. 
it off for common ufe, the water being only juft colored with 
the tea. 
When the higher ranks of the people ufe it, either as a com- 
mon drink, or an entertainment, they infufe a fmall quantity 
in every cup, contenting themfelves with the flavor and tafte 
of the fubtler parts, without drawing it down with water, as 
we generally pradtife. If my intelligence is true, they drink 
very little or no green tea, alledging, that it rather difturbs 
than promotes digeftion, particularly new green tea, which, 
they fay, occaftons fevers. It muft be obferved, that tea, be- 
ing good of its kind, and kept from the air inclofed in lead, 
will keep fifteen or twenty years, or longer. 
As to green tea, it is chiefly confumed by the tartars in 
and about china, alfo in feveral parts of india. Till within 
thefe thirty or forty years, a much lefs quantity of this kind was 
cultivated in china ; but iince there has been fo prodigious a 
demand for Europe, hardly any quantity of tea in general, 
which the Chinese can well fupply, is fuflicient. Some of the 
European markets have indeed been glutted for a fhort time, 
but notwithftanding china exceed us fo greatly in number of 
inhabitants, it is queftioned if they confume fo much tea as we 
and the Hollanders. 
The Chinese alfo difter from us in this, that they frequently 
ufe acids with their tea inftead of sweets. Indeed I wonder 
fo few of the female world deviate from the path which their 
mothers have trod before them, efpecially when their health is 
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