On the whole, it seems to me that the probabilities are in favour of an African origin, as its name indicates, and this is confirmed by the general, but insufficiently grounded opinion of authors.[567] However, as the plant spreads so rapidly, it is strange that it has not reached Egypt from the Mozambique or Abyssinia, and that it was introduced so late into the islands to the east of Africa. If the co-existence of phanerogamous species in Africa and America previous to cultivation were not extremely rare, it might be inferred in this case; but this is unlikely in the case of a cultivated plant of which the diffusion is evidently very easy.
Article III.—Various Uses of the Stem and Leaves.
Tea—Thea sinensis, Linnæus.
In the middle of the eighteenth century, when the shrub which produces tea was still very little known, Linnæus gave it the name of Thea sinensis. Soon afterwards, in the second edition of the Species Plantarum, he judged it better to distinguish two species, Thea bohea and Thea viridis, which he believed to correspond to the commercial distinction between black and green teas. It has since been proved that there is but one species, comprehending several varieties, from all of which either black or green tea may be obtained according to the process of manufacture. This question was settled, when another was raised, as to whether Thea really forms a genus by itself distinct from the genus Camellia. Some authors make Thea a section of the old genus Camellia; but from the characters indicated with great precision by Seemann,[568] it seems to me that we are justified in retaining the genus Thea, together with the old nomenclature of the principal species.
A Japanese legend, related by Kæmpfer,[569] is often quoted. A priest who came from India into China in A.D. 519, having succumbed to sleep when he had wished to watch and pray, in a movement of anger cut off his two eyelids, which were changed into a shrub, the tea tree, whose leaves are eminently calculated to prevent sleep. Unfortunately for those people who readily admit legends in whole or in part, the Chinese have never heard of this story, although the event is said to have taken place in their country. Tea was known to them long before 519, and probably it was not brought from India. This is what Bretschneider tells us in his little work, rich in botanical and philological facts.[570] The Pentsao, he says, mentions tea 2700 B.C., the Rye 300 or 600 B.C.; and the commentator of the latter work, in the fourth century of our era, gave details about the plant and about the infusion of the leaves. Its use is, therefore, of very ancient date in China. It is perhaps more recent in Japan, and if it has been long known in Cochin-China, it is possible, but not proved, that it formerly spread thither from India; authors cite no Sanskrit name, nor even any name in modern Indian languages. This fact will appear strange when contrasted with what we have to say on the natural habitat of the species.
The seeds of the tea-plant often sow themselves beyond the limits of cultivation, thereby inspiring doubt among botanists as to the wild nature of plants encountered here and there. Thunberg believed the species to be wild in Japan, but Franchet and Savatier[571] absolutely deny this. Fortune,[572] who has so carefully examined the cultivation of tea in China, does not speak of the wild plant. Fontanier[573] says that the tea-plant grows wild abundantly in Mantschuria. It is probable that it exists in the mountainous districts of South-eastern China, where naturalists have not yet penetrated. Loureiro says that it is found both “cultivated and uncultivated” in Cochin-China.[574] What is more certain is, that English travellers gathered specimens in Upper Assam[575] and in the province of Cachar.[576] So that the tea-plant must be wild in the mountainous region which separates the plains of India from those of China, but the use of the leaves was not formerly known in India.
The cultivation of tea, now introduced into several colonies, has produced admirable results in Assam. Not only is the product of a superior quality to that of average Chinese teas, but the quantity obtained increases rapidly. In 1870, three million pounds of tea were produced in British India; in 1878, thirty-seven million pounds; and in 1880, a harvest of seventy million pounds was looked for.[577] Tea will not bear frost, and suffers from drought. As I have elsewhere stated,[578] the conditions which favour it are the opposite to those which suit the vine. On the other hand, it has been observed that tea flourishes in Azores, where good wine is made;[579] but it is possible to cultivate in gardens, or on a small scale, many plants which will not be profitable on a large scale. The vine grows in China, yet the manufacture of wine is unimportant. Conversely, no wine-growing country grows tea for exportation. After China, Japan, and Assam, it is in Java, Ceylon, and Brazil that tea is most largely grown, where, certainly, the vine is little cultivated, or not at all; while the wines of dry regions, such as Australia and the Cape, are already known in the market.
Flax—Linum usitatissimum, Linnæus.
The question as to the origin of flax, or rather of the cultivated flax, is one of those which give rise to most interesting researches.
In order to understand the difficulties which it presents, we must first ascertain what nearly allied forms authors designate—sometimes as distinct species of the genus Linum, and sometimes as varieties of a single species.