GUNPOWDER TEA. 163 
it will crumble to dust. When infused in water the 
leaf should appear open, clear, and smooth, and should 
tinge the water a light green colour ; the infusion ought 
to have an aromatic smell, and a strong pungent taste. 
(c) Gunpowder tea is a superior kind of hyson, 
gathered and dried with peculiar care. This tea should 
be chosen in round grains, somewhat resembling small 
shot, with a beautiful bloom upon it which will not 
bear the breath: it should have a greenish hue, and a 
fragrant pungent taste. Gunpowder tea is sometimes 
adulterated ; an inferior kind being dyed and glazed in 
such manner as to resemble it ; but, on infusion, this is 
found in every respect very inferior. 
Tea, both black and green, is sometimes imported 
in balls from the weight of two ounces to the size of 
peas. 
The dried leaves of the tea plant are a commodity 
which, a century and a half ago, were scarcely known 
as an article of trade. The earliest importation of tea 
into Europe is said to have been by a Dutch merchant 
in 1610; but the time of its first introduction into Eng- 
land has not been correctly ascertained. So scarce an 
article was it, for many years after the above period, 
that, in 1666, twenty-two pounds and three quarters of 
tea, estimated at fifty shillings a pound, were presented, 
as a valuable gift, to King Charles the Second. The first 
importation of tea by the East India Company was in 
1669, and this consisted only of two canisters, weigh- 
ing 14<31b. 8oz. So rapidty, however, has the consump- 
tion of this article since increased, that, notwith- 
standing the immense distance from which it is brought, 
it now amounts to more than twenty millions of pounds* 
weight per annum. Such is, at present, the extent of the 
tea trade, that it affords constant employment for at 
leat 50,000 tons of shipping, and 6,000 seamen ; and 
its importance to us is the greater since it has been the 
means of opening, in China, a market for the sale of 
woollen goods, one of the most essential articles of our 
