26 
A VOYAGE T O 
wft i?ormed me ?that a flirub is common here, agreeing exa&ly 
wJ with tlie description given by Tournefort and Linnaeus, of 
the tea [hrlib) as growing in China and Japan. It is rec¬ 
koned a weed, and he roots ont thonfands of them every 
year from his vineyards. The Spaniards however, of the 
illand, fometimes life it as tea, and afcribe to it all the qua¬ 
lities of that imported from China. They alfo give it the 
name of tea; but what is remarkable, they fay it was, 
found here when the iffcands were firft difcovered. 
Another botanical curiofity, mentioned by him, is what 
they call the impregnated lemon *. It is a perfect and dif- 
tinff lemon, inclofed within another, differing from the 
outer one only in being a little more globular. The leaves 
of the tree that produces this fort, are much longer than 
thofe of the common one ; and it was reprefented to me as 
being crooked, and not equal in beauty. 
From him I learnt alfo, that a certain fort of grape 
growing here, is reckoned an excellent remedy in phthiff- 
cal complaints : and the air and climate, in general, are 
remarkably healthful, and particularly adapted to give re¬ 
lief in fuch difeafes. This he endeavoured to account for, 
by its being always in one’s power to procure a different 
temperature of the air, by redding at different heights in 
the illand ; and he expreffed his furprize that the Englifb 
phylicians fhould never have thought of lending their con- 
fumptive patients to Teneriffe, inftead of Nice or Lifbon. 
How much the temperature of the air varies here, I myfelf 
could fenfibly perceive, only in riding from Santa Cruz up 
to Laguna; and you may afcend till the cold becomes in- 
* The Writer of the Relation of Teneriffe , in Sprat’s Hi/lory , p. 207, takes notice 
of this lemon as produced here, and calls it Pregnada . Probably, etnprennada , the Spa- 
xrilh word for iImpregnated , is the name it goes by. 
tolerable* 
