A General View of TEA. 2 05 
cinnamon, and fuch like, which they ufe as an entertainment, 
not as we do tea, at Hated hours, and all kinds of people with- 
out distinction. They pay the dutch for the cinnamon 
partly in the filver which they receive for their raw filk, fold to 
the turks, or acquired by their commerce with the Indians ; 
but I believe much the greateft fhare in their drugs and manu- 
factures. 
The Indians drink tea, but not fo generally as we do, and 
they pay the Chinese for it in pepper, tin, fandell wood, and 
fuch like. I never heard that the Africans are debauched 
with tea ; and in the new world, I dare fay to one pound of 
tea which all the other nations confume, in proportion to the 
number of inhabitants, the British fubjects confume twenty. 
Thus you fee how we lay the burthen of enriching china, 
from whofe friendlhip or alliance we can expect no kind of 
fuccour in time of danger, upon our own fhoulders, and make 
ourfelves the dupes of our own folly ! 
With regard to our immenfe confumption of tea in gene- 
ral, we have been lately told, that France alone, has run on 
the coafts of kent and sussex, 400 tons, making 896,000 
pounds weight : but this is fo much exaggerated, one would 
imagine it was thrown out with no honeft purpofe. What the 
real quantity has been, I do not pretend to afcertain ; but from 
the belt intelligence I can procure, and from what I fee of the 
immenfe confumption, I make no doubt, that from France, the 
united provinces, Denmark, Sweden, and Prussia, brought 
in by fmuggling vefiels, and veffels which fmuggle, there has 
R r not 
