When we cast our eyes on the absurd names which many Italian academies adopted to characterize the nature of their studies, we find an ample illustration of this science in the Seraphici, the Oscuri, the Immaturi, the Infecundi, the Offuscati, the Somnolenti, and Phantastici!
The most ridiculous and disgusting epithets have been considered honourable distinctions. Thus, when the science of Uroscopia and Uromancy prevailed, we find a Dr. Theodorus Charles, a Wirtemberg physician, calling another learned practitioner, “Urinosa Claritas.”
ON THE USE OF TEA.
Such is the growing consumption of this now indispensable article in England, that in 1789 there were imported 14,534,601 lbs., and in 1833 the quantity was increased to 31,829,620 lbs.; the latter importation yielding a revenue of 3,444,101l. In other countries we find the consumption much less. Russia in 1832 imported 6,461,064 lbs.; Holland consumes about 2,800,000 lbs., and France only 230,000 lbs.
It is supposed that tea was first introduced into Europe by the Dutch, about the middle of the seventeenth century; and Lords Arlington and Ossory are said to be the first persons who made it known in England. In 1641, Tulpius, a Dutch physician, mentioned it in his works. In 1667, Fouquet, a French physician, recommended it to the French faculty; and in 1678, an elaborate treatise was written on it by Cornelius Boutkoë, physician to the Elector of Brandenburg. About the same time, several travellers and missionaries, amongst whom we find Kœmpfer, Kalm, Osbeck, Duhalde, and Lecomte, give various accounts of the plant and its divers qualities.
The Chinese name of this plant is theh, a Fokien word. In the Mandarin it is tcha, and the Japanese call it tsjaa. Loureiro, in his Flora Cochin-China, describes three species of tea. It is a polyandrous plant of the natural order Columniferæ, growing to a height varying from three to six feet, and bearing a great resemblance to our myrtle. The blossom is white, with yellow style and anthers, not unlike that of the dog-rose; the leaves are the only valuable part of the plant. The camellias, particularly the camellia sesanqua, of the same natural family, are the only plants liable to be confounded with it. The leaves of the latter camellia are indeed frequently used as a substitute for those of the tea-plant in several districts of China. This shrub is a hardy evergreen, growing in the open air from the equator to the forty-fifth degree of northern latitude; but the climate that appears the most congenial to it seems to be between the twenty-fifth and thirty-third degree. Almost every province and district in China produces tea for local consumption: but what is cultivated for trade is chiefly in Fokien, Canton, Kiang-nan, Kiang-si, and Che-Kiang; Fokien being celebrated for its black tea, and Kiang-nan for the green. The plant is also cultivated in Japan, Tonquin, and Cochin-China, and in some parts of the mountainous tracts of Ava, where, in addition to its use in infusion, it is converted into a pickle preserved in oil. When tea was first introduced as a luxury on particular occasions in the wild districts of Ireland, the people used to throw away the water in which it had been boiled, and eat the leaves with salt-butter or bacon like greens. The Dutch are now endeavouring to propagate this valuable plant in Java, and for that purpose employ cultivators, who have emigrated from Fokien. The Brazilians are making similar attempts, and some tolerable tea has been reared near Rio Janeiro.
The black teas usually imported from Canton are the bohea, congou, souchong, and pekoe, according to our orthography: the French missionaries spelt them as follows: boui, camphou or campoui, saotchaon, and pekao or peko. Our green teas are the twankay, hyson-skin, and hyson, imperial, and gunpowder; the first of which French travellers write tonkay, hayswin-skine, and hayswin. The French import a tea called têhulan, but it is artificially flavoured with a leaf called lan hoa, or the olea fragrans of Linnæus.
The tea-plant grows to perfection in two or three years: the leaves are carefully picked by the family of the growers, and immediately carried to market, where they are purchased for drying in sheds. The tea-merchants from Canton repair to the several districts where it is produced, and, after purchasing the leaves thus simply desiccated, submit them to various manipulations; after which they are packed in branded cases and parcels called chops, from a Chinese word meaning a seal. Some of the leaf-buds of the finest black tea plants are picked early in the spring, before they expand: these constitute pekoe, sometimes called “white-blossomed tea,” from their being intermixed with the blossoms of the olea fragrans. The younger the leaf, the more high-flavoured and valuable is the tea. Green teas are grown and gathered in the same manner; but amongst these the gunpowder stands in the grade of the pekoe among the black, being prepared with the unopened buds of the spring crops. The alleged preparation of green teas upon copper plates, to give them a verdant colour, is an idle story. They are dried in iron vases over a gentle fire; and the operator conducts this delicate work with his naked hand, and the utmost care not to break the fragile leaves. This part of the manipulation is considered the most difficult, as the leaves are rolled into their usual shape between the palms of the hands until they are cold, to prevent them from unrolling. Teas are adulterated by various odoriferous plants, more especially the vitex pinnata, the chloranthus inconspicuus, and the illicium anisatum. In our markets the chief adulteration is operated by the mixture of sloe and ash leaves, and colouring with terra Japonica and other drugs.