Johnson did not make verses in its honor, but he has drawn his own portrait as “a hardened and shameless tea drinker, who for twenty years diluted his meals with an infusion of this fascinating plant, whose kettle had scarcely time to cool, who with tea amused the evening, with tea solaced the night, and with tea welcomed the morning.” While Brady, in his well-known metrical version of the psalms, thus illustrates its advantages:—
“Over our tea conversations we employ,
Where with delight instructions we enjoy,
Quaffing without waste of time or wealth
The soverign drink of pleasure and of health.”
Cooper’s praise of the beverage has been sadly hackneyed, nevertheless, as the Laureate of the tea table, his lines are worthy of reproduction here:—
“While the bubbling and loud hissing urn
Throws up a steaming column, and the cup
That cheers, but not inebriates, wait on each,
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.”