Showing varieties most in demand in the United States:—

Varieties. Kinds. Quantity, Pounds.
Oolong, (Formosa), 10,000,000
“ (Amoy and Foochow), 8,000,000
Green Teas, (all kinds), 10,000,000
Japans, “ 38,000,000
Pekoes and Congous, (China), 10,000,000
India, Java and Ceylon, 6,000,000
————
Total, 82,000,000

During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1890, there was imported into the United States, at all ports, 84,627,870 pounds of tea, of which 43,043,651 pounds were received from China and 37,627,560 pounds from Japan, the balance consisting of imports from India, Java and Ceylon, received via England and Holland. The United States official reports show that tea represents 27 per cent. of the total value of imported merchandise into this country. The gross trade in the article, however, even at retail prices, does not exceed $35,000,000, the total annual value of all food products being about $220,000,000, of which tea only represents a value of $13,000,000, equivalent to about 6 per cent. of the whole.

In round numbers the consumption of tea in the principal importing countries has increased from 350,000,000 pounds in 1880 to upwards of 400,000,000 pounds in 1892. To which may be added for the minor consuming countries another 60,000,000 pounds, in which case we get a grand total of 460,000,000 pounds. Tea consumption in India and Ceylon is scarce worth computing, and it is also claimed that the consumption in China has been greatly exaggerated, for although the Chinese drink tea constantly much of the liquor is little different from hot water, so that to credit China and her feudatories with another 500,000,000 pounds would be an extravagant estimate. But, admitting it to be near the mark, we may then take in round numbers 1,000,000,000 pounds of leaf, or say 6,000,000,000 gallons, as the world’s annual consumption of tea. But it is confidently predicted that if peace be preserved and wealth and civilization continues to advance that much greater increase during the closing years of the present century and the whole of the twentieth century—for large portions of mankind are at length discovering that alcohol with its “borrowed fire” is a deceiver and a curse. If the civilization of an age or a community can be tested by the quantity of sulphuric acid which it uses, much more certainly can the moral status of a time and a people be judged by a comparison of the quantities of alcoholic and non-alcoholic stimulants it uses.

All teas have declined one-half in value during the past ten years, owing to the increased production of India and Ceylon, the position of the market at the present time is, however, unique and unusual. Heretofore the rule has been for the supply to exceed the demand, particularly of China tea, it being the custom to claim that the market would never run short of the latter, as the production could be increased to meet any sudden or excessive demand. Now, however, the position is entirely different, the shortage in China tea the past year reaching some 21,000,000 pounds, to which must be added the increase in consumption of 11,500,000 pounds, due in a measure to the reduction of the duty in England, against which deficit is to be placed the increase of production in India of 3,000,000 pounds, and that of Ceylon of 15,000,000 pounds, but still leaving a shortage of 14,000,000 pounds. This position has led to an advance in China common grades, part of which is undoubtedly due to speculation. With decreased imports and increased consumption in the market, however, appears to have all the requisite of strength to sustain it, and it will be years before it reaches its late low point again.

With the great reduction in importation price and keener competition the retail prices have been brought down to a very low figure, and as the dealer has educated the public to the purchase of poor teas at low prices it is not likely that the retail prices of teas will ever reach any higher figure unless war or other cause should lead to a duty being placed on the article. Yet, notwithstanding these unprecedented low prices, the per capita consumption of tea is comparatively very low in this country at the present time, one of the chief causes being traceable to the custom prevalent among dealers of charging exorbitant profits in order to make up for the losses made in other goods. This impolitic practice may be forgiven were it not for the greater mistake they make of sacrificing quality to profit, which in articles of daily use like tea is an important consideration. By rectifying this error, and giving more attention to the careful selection of their teas, there is no valid reason why the consumption of tea in this country could not at the least calculation be doubled, more particularly in the present state of the coffee market, as it is generally calculated that one pound of good tea equals four pounds of coffee in amount and strength of its extract, besides being cheaper and more convenient to prepare. Under these circumstances it may be assumed that there is no probability of any material change in the cost of tea to the dealer and there should be no further reduction in the selling price to the consumer, any further reduction in the retail price involving a diminution of profit which the trade can ill afford to bear at the present time.

CHAPTER X.
TEA-CULTURE, A PROBABLE AMERICAN INDUSTRY.

In 1858 the United States Government ordered and received about 10,000 tea-plants from China in Wardian cases in which the seeds were sown just previous to shipment, many of them germinated during the voyage, the plants averaging 18 inches in height on their arrival in this country. Being immediately placed under propagation they were in a very short time increased to over 30,000, which were widely distributed throughout the Southern States, the propagation and distribution of tea-plants forming a prominent feature in the operations of the Agricultural Department up to the commencement of the civil war in 1861, which put a stop to all experiments in the industry. For several years after its close but little attention was given to the propagation of the plant in this country, still at no time was it entirely abandoned by the Department during this period. It being fully understood, that so far as the growth of the plant was concerned it could undoubtedly be successfully cultivated over a large extent of the country. But many of those interested sharing in the belief that the amount and cost of the manual labor required in its manipulation for market was so great as to preclude the probability of competing with low-waged Asiatics, no special efforts were again made to disseminate plants or to multiply them further than to supply such applicants as desired to make experimental tests.