Tea manufacture is now the most important branch in the industry. We have advanced greatly in the last few years; but Tea manufacture, as regards economy in doing it, is yet comparatively in its infancy. Still we have done a great deal since the indigenous plant was discovered in the jungles of Assam, now nearly fifty years ago; we have advanced more in Tea manufacture than the Chinese, who have been making Tea many centuries. That is to say, I affirm that the Indian Tea planter of ordinary intelligence knows more of both Tea cultivation and Tea manufacture to-day than any of his Chinese contemporaries. The Chinaman grows Tea, and makes Tea, as he taught us to do it twenty to thirty years ago. The pupil in this case has certainly beaten his master. We have made some improvements in Tea planting and Tea cultivation, but where we have left our teachers far behind is in manufacture. “Johnny” makes his Tea as his father made it before him, taught by his grandfather who made it the same way; and, for aught we know, no improvements, in that way, have taken place in the course of many centuries. All is hand labour; machinery to them is unknown. The most primitive ideas in Tea manufacture are still adhered to. In support of the latter, I will quote one instance: Tea, from time immemorial, has always been dried by charcoal in China; no other way is known there now. How is it here in India? A large proportion of the produce is fired with other fuel, aided by machinery; and it is only a question of time (and a very short time) when the whole of it will be thus prepared. I could quote other instances: let this suffice, for no comparison can be drawn between Tea manufacture as followed out in China and India in this year 1881. The former is as crude as it was two or five hundred years ago: the latter (though still far from perfection) in its many details, in its numerous machines cleverly contrived to save labour and better the Teas, is a striking illustration of the activity, the energy, the inventive genius of the Anglo-Saxon race!
An Indian Tea factory, well set up with machinery—that is to say with a green-leaf drying apparatus, rolling machines, Tea dryers, equalisers, and sifting and sorting machines, all driven by an engine of 15-horse power—offers a wonderful contrast to a Chinese Tea factory, where all is handwork. But more strange still is the comparison alongside of the fact, that in the former case the industry dates back only some thirty years; in the latter many centuries.
Tea machinery is destined to work great results in India. When brought to perfection (it is far on the road now), it will so cheapen the cost of manufacture that, though labour is dearer with us than in China, we shall, thanks thereto, be able to lay down our Teas at cheaper rates than the produce of the Flowery Land. If Indian Tea ever vies in quantity with China in the Tea-consuming countries of the world, it will be due entirely to the economy effected by our machinery. I do not myself anticipate that Indian Teas will ever beat China out of the field, but, inasmuch as our Teas are better, because the taste for Indian Tea is growing apace, I do believe the day will come (it will scarcely be in our time) that the Tea exports from India will equal those from China; and, as I said before, to machinery, far more than to anything else, will that end be due.
There is therefore no question of more importance to the Indian planter to-day than Tea machinery. It is a difficult question too, because so many machines, for each of the different necessary processes, are vieing in competition for public favour. “Which is the best machine to buy?” is the question one hears asked daily. I propose, with your leave, to write a series of articles on Tea machinery, pointing out, as far as in me lies, the advantages and defects of those which commend themselves most to me, for I wish to give planters, through your paper, the advantage of my experience; and as my expressing an opinion in no way precludes others from doing the same, and I know your columns are open to all, I would invite discussion on rival merits, and thus certainly benefit the Tea industry.
I will to-day describe what, I think, is the best Tea sifting and fanning machine extant. It is true it is the last machine used in manufacture, but that does not signify; I will take all the others in turn.
The said machine is the invention of an able man and engineer, Mr. C. W. Ansell, well known in the Darjeeling district for his knowledge of Tea machinery. He has been for many years employed as an engineer in Tea factories. I heard of his machine when I was lately in England, and went down to Ipswich to the manufactory of Messrs. Ransomes, Sims, and Head to see it. Though difficult to judge of it, as there was no Tea wherewith to test it, I was so pleased with the principle that I ordered one. The cost was £80. It has now been working on one of my gardens some thirteen months, and in every way it has proved a great success. But to describe it, as far as I can, in a few words:—
Its length is 19 feet, its breadth 5 feet. The Tea, in bulk, is delivered through a hopper from an upper floor, on what I will call the A end of the machine, to distinguish it from the other end, which I will name B. The principle of all other sifters (except Jackson’s), as far as I know, is, that the succeeding trays of differing wire mesh are arranged one below the other, the slope all being the same way, that is—from A to B. This plan is objectionable in the following way: if the Tea has been well rolled and clings together, a good deal of the fine Teas that are in the mass or bulk often passes some distance down, perhaps over half the tray or wire-mesh length, before falling through. If they do so, and the object is to sift out any particular class on the next succeeding tray, there is only half the length of mesh left to traverse to effect the object, instead of the whole length of the tray. This is obviated in practice by pushing the Teas continually back up the inclined tray; but this is done at the expense of extra labour and making the Teas dusty and grey.
The above objection is obviated in Ansell’s machine. It consists of four slopes, but each of these incline downwards, alternately, different ways—viz., No. 1 (the upper), from A to B; No. 2, from B to A; No. 3, from A to B; No. 4, from B to A, and below the mesh of each slope is a carrying tin tray, sloping the same way, which carries all the Tea which falls through each mesh down to the head of the succeeding slope, while in each case the Tea which will not pass through the mesh is delivered separately. The above arrangement, however, does not hold with the upper or No. 1 slope. This consists of two wire trays or meshes, with the carrying tray below the lower one. Such of the bulk as will not pass through the upper tray is delivered on the head of No. 2 slope, at the B end of the machine. What passes through the upper tray, but will not pass through the lower, is delivered by a side shoot at the B end of the machine, and is “No. 1 Pekoe.” What passes through both sieves on to the carrying tray is also delivered by an opposite side shoot from the B end of the machine, and is “Broken Pekoe.” Between Nos. 1 and 2 slopes is an air chamber, which, as the bulk left on the upper sieve of No. 1 slope falls on the head of slope No. 2 (a blast being sent through it by a fan at the A end of the machine), drives out of the said falling bulk all red leaf, stalks, fannings, &c.
No. 2 slope receives the bulk at the B end of the machine, after the red leaf and fannings are taken out as stated above, and what will not pass through the mesh is delivered at the back of the A end of the machine, and is “Congou;” while what does fall through the mesh into the carrying tray below it (which is still bulk, consisting of “Pekoe,” “Pekoe Souchong,” and “Souchong” mixed) is delivered at the A end of the machine on to the head of No. 3 slope.
What will not pass through the mesh of No. 3 slope is delivered at the B end of the machine in front, and is “Souchong;” while what does pass through the mesh of No. 3 slope on to the carrying tray below (still bulk, consisting of “Pekoe” and “Pekoe Souchong”) is delivered on to the head of No. 4 slope at the B end of the machine.