399 
The plant comes into plentiful bearing of its product as 
early as the Vine and earlier than the Olive. Its culture 
is surrounded with no difficulties, and it is singularly exempt 
from diseases if planted in proper localities. Pruning is 
effected in the cool season, in order to obtain a large 
quantity of small tender leaves from young branches. 
Both the Chinese and Assam tea are produced by varieties 
of one single species, the Tea-shruh being indigenous in the 
forest-country of Assam. Declivities are best adapted and 
usually chosen for tea-culture, particularly for Congo, Pekoe 
and Souchong, while Bohea is often grown in flat countries. 
Por many full details Eortune’s work, “ The Tea-Districts 
of China,” might be consulted. 
The tea of commerce consists of the young leaves, heated, 
curled and sweated. The process of preparing the leaves 
can be effected by steam machinery ; one of particular con- 
struction has been suggested recently by Mr. Joachimi 
according to requirements explained by the writer. In 
1866 three machines for dressing tea have been patented in 
England, one by Messrs. Campbell and Burgess, one by 
Mr. Thomson and one by Mr. Tayser. To give an idea of 
the quantity of Tea, which is consumed at the present 
time, it may be stated, that from June to September, 1871, 
11,000,000 lbs. of tea were shipped from China alone to 
Australia, and that the produce of tea in India from January 
to J une of this year has been 18,500,000 lbs. Seeds of the 
Tea-bush are now in many parts of this colony locally to be 
gathered from plants distributed by the writer, and for 
years to come the cultivation of the Tea-bush, merely to 
secure local supplies of fresh seeds, ready to germinate, will 
in all likelihood prove highly lucrative. Tea contains an 
alkaloid : Coflein, a peculiar essential oil and Bohea-acid 
along with other substances. 
Thrinax parviflora, Swartz. 
West India, and also on the continent of Central America. 
The stem of this Ean-palm attains a height of 25 feet. It 
belongs to the sand-tracts of the coast and may endure our 
clime. The fibre of this Palm forms material for ropes. 
