Tea, its history and mystery

by Joseph M. Walsh

It was not known to the Greeks or Romans in any form; and that it could not have been known in India in very early times is inferred from the fact that no reference to the plant or its product is to be found in the Sanscrit. But that the plant and its use, not only as an agreeable and exhilarating beverage, but as an article of traffic worthy of other nations, must have been known to the Chinese as early as the first century of the Christian era, the following extract from an ancient work entitled the “Periplous of the Erythræan Sea,” may serve to prove. The author, usually supposed to be Arryan, after describing “a city called Thinæ,” proceeds to narrate a yearly mercantile journey to the vicinity of “a certain people called Sesatæi, of short stature, broad faces, and flat noses”—evidently natives of China—adds “that the articles they bring for traffic outwardly resemble vine leaves, being wrapped in mats, which they leave behind them on their departure to their own country in the interior. From these mats the Thinæ pick out a haulm, called petros, from which they draw the fibre and stalks; spreading out the leaves, they double and make them up into balls, passing the fibre through them, in which form they take the name of Malabathrum, and under this name they are brought into India by those who so prepare them.” Under any interpretation this account sounds like a remote, obscure and confused story. Still one of the authors of the able “Historical Account of China,” published in 1836, has ventured to identify this Malabathrum of the Thinæ with the Tea of the Chinese. Vossius Vincent and other authors, while admitting the difficulty of understanding why it should be carried from Arracan to China, and from China back to India, unhesitatingly assert that Malabathrum was nothing more than the Betel-leaf, so widely used in the East at the time as a masticatory. Horace mentions Malabathrum, but only as an ointment. Pliny refers to it both in that sense and as a medicine. Dioscorides describing it as a masticatory only. While the author of the “Historical Account” prefers to consider the passage in the Periplous as a very clumsy description of a process not intelligently understood by the describer, but as agreeing far better with the manipulation of Tea than with that of the Betel-leaf, and his conjecture, unsupported as it is, merits citation if only for its originality.

The first positive reference to Tea is that by Kieu-lung in the fourth century, who not only describes the plant, but also the process of preparing it, of which the following is a free and condensed translation: “On a slow fire set a tripod, whose color and texture show its long use, and fill it with clear snow-water. Boil it as long as would be sufficient to turn cray-fish red, and throw it upon the delicate leaves of choice Tea. Let it remain as long as the vapor arises in a cloud and only a thin mist floats on the surface. Then at your ease drink the precious liquor so prepared, which will chase away the five causes of sorrow. You can taste and feel, but not describe the state of repose produced by a beverage thus prepared.” It is again mentioned by Lo-yu, a learned Chinese, who lived during the dynasty of Tang, in 618, who became quite enthusiastic in its praise, claiming that “It tempers the spirits, harmonizes the mind, dispels lassitude and relieves fatigue, awakens thought and clears the perceptive faculties,” and according to the Kiang-moo, an historical epitome, an impost duty was levied on Tea as early as 782 by the Emperor Te-Tsing, and continued to the present day.

McPherson, in his “History of European Commerce with India,” states that Tea is mentioned as the usual beverage of the Chinese by Solieman, an Arabian merchant, who wrote an account of his travels in the East about the year 850. By the close of the ninth century, however, Tea was found in general use among the Chinese, the tax upon it at that time being a source of considerable revenue as recorded by Abuzeid-el-Hazen, an Arabian traveler cited by Renaudot in a translation of his work. There is also independent evidence furnished by two other Arabian travelers in a narrative of their wanderings during the latter half of the ninth century, admitting their statements to be trustworthy as to the general use of Tea as a beverage among the Chinese at that period. Moorish travelers appear to have introduced it into Mohammedan countries early in the tenth century, and other travelers in China in the seventeenth give most extravagant accounts of its virtues, which appears to have been in very general use throughout the greater part of Asia at that time.

Father de Rhodes, a Jesuit missionary, who entered China in 1633, states that “the use of Tea is common throughout the East, and begins, I perceive, to be known in Europe. It is in all the world to be found only in two provinces of China, where the gathering of it occupies the people as the vintage does us.” Adding that he found it in his own case to be an instantaneous remedy for headache, and when compelled to sit up all night to hear confessions its use saved him from drowsiness and fatigue. Adam Olearius, describing the travels of an embassy to Persia in 1631, says of the Persians: “They are great frequenters of taverns, called Tzai Chattai, where they drink Thea or Cha, which the Tartars bring from China, and to which they assign extravagant qualities, imagining that it alone will keep a man in perfect health, and are sure to treat all who visit them to this drink at all hours.” These strong expressions as to the use of Tea, applying as they do to a period not later than 1640, are sufficient to prove that the ordinary accounts place the introduction of that beverage as regards Europe, particularly the Continent, as too late.

INTRODUCTION INTO EUROPE.

The earliest European notice of Tea is that found in a work by Ramusio, first printed in 1550, though written several years prior to that year. In it he quotes Hazzi Mohamed in effect, “And these people of Cathay (China) do say that if these in our parts of the world only knew of Tea, there is no doubt that our merchants would cease altogether to use Ravino Cini, as they call rhubarb.” Yet no accounts at present accessible establish the date of its first introduction into Europe, and it is also a difficult matter to determine to which of the two nations—Portugal or Holland—the credit of first introducing it belongs. Some writers claiming that the Dutch East India Company brought Tea to Amsterdam in 1600, while the Portuguese claim the honor of its first introduction prior to that year. An indisputable argument in favor of the latter is the notice given of it by Giovani Maffei in his “History of India,” published in 1559. “The inhabitants of China, like those of Japan,” he writes, “extract from an herb called Chia a beverage which they drink warm, and which is extremely wholesome, being a remedy against phlegm, languor and a promoter of longevity.” While Giovani Botero, another Portuguese, in a work published in the same year, states that “the Chinese have an herb from which they press a delicate juice, which they use instead of wine, finding it to be a preservative against these diseases which are produced by the use of wine amongst us.” Taxiera, also a native of Portugal, states that he saw the dried leaves of Tea at Malacca some years prior to 1600, and the article is also mentioned in one of the earliest privileges accorded to the Portuguese for trading in 1558; yet it was not until nearly a century from the beginning of that trade that we find the first distinct account from a European pen of the use of Tea as a beverage.

In a “Dissertation upon Tea, by Thomas Short,” printed in London, in 1730, the author gives the following account of its first introduction into Europe: “The Dutch East India Company on their second voyage to China carried thither a good store of Sage and exchanged it with the Chinese for Tea, receiving three to four pounds of the last for one pound of the first, by calling it a wonderful European herb possessed of as many virtues as the Indians could ascribe to their shrub-leaf. But because they exported not such large quantities of Sage as they imported of Tea they also bought a great deal of the latter, giving eight- to tenpence a pound for it in China. And when they first brought it to Paris they sold it for thirty livres the pound; but thirty years ago the Chinese sold it at threepence, and never above ninepence a pound at any time, frequently mixing it with other herbs to increase the quantity.” Macaulay also states in the history of his embassy to China that “early in the seventeenth century some Dutch adventurers, seeking for such objects as might fetch a price in China, and hearing of a general use there of a beverage produced from a plant of the country, bethought themselves of trying how far a European plant of supposed great virtues might also be appreciated by the Chinese; they accordingly introduced to them the herb Sage, the Dutch accepting in exchange the Chinese Tea, which they brought back with them to Holland.” These statements but tend to confirm the Portuguese claim, the efforts of the Dutch to open up trade with the Chinese in Tea being evidently made many years subsequent to its introduction by the former; in still further support of which the following may be noted:—

In 1662 Charles II. married the Portuguese princess, Catharine of Braganza, who, it is said, was very fond of Tea, having been accustomed to it in her own country. Waller, in a poem celebrating the event, ascribes its first introduction to her country in the appended lines:—

“Venus her myrtle has—Phœbus her bays;

Tea both excels, which she vouchsafes to praise.