Frezier gives us an illustration of Maté drinking, in which we see a lady using the bombilla, although the Maté cup has an apartador. The silver kettle for supplying hot water is fed with charcoal at the side, and somewhat resembles the Russian Samovar.
We give a modern Maté cup and bombilla; but this, which is made wholly of silver, is only intended for one person’s use.
Sometimes the Maté cups are made of the gourds of the Cuca (Crescentia Cujete) or Cabaço (Cucurbita lagenaria) silver mounted. Indeed, the cup itself is the Maté, which gives the name to the herb, meaning, in the language of the Incas, a calabash. The decoction is drank with a little brown sugar or lemon added, never with milk, and if not drank very quickly will turn quite black.
It loses in flavour and aroma by keeping, so that in England it cannot possibly be drunk in perfection, which, of course, can only be done on the spot where it is produced. Its virtues are much vaunted. It is supposed to give nervous vigour, and to enable the system to resist fatigue; but this can scarcely account for the enormous quantity drunk, although to persons unused to it, when taken in large doses it is both purgative and emetic.
Like Chinese tea, it has a volatile oil, which gives it its peculiar aroma; it also contains nearly 2 per cent. of theine, and about 16 per cent. of an astringent acid, resembling tannin, which causes the infusion to turn black after a slight exposure to the air.
There is another variety of Maté, called Gongonha, which is drunk in Brazil, which is prepared from two other species of holly, the Ilex Gongonha and the Ilex Theezans. In Chili a tea is made from the leaves of the Psoralea glandulosa, and in Central America an infusion of the leaves of the Capraria bifolia is drunk.
J. A.
