The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom / Considered in Their Various Uses to Man and in Their Relation to the Arts and Manufactures; Forming a Practical Treatise & Handbook of Reference for the Colonist, Manufacturer, Merchant, and Consumer, on the Cultivation, Preparation for Shipment, and Commercial Value, &c. of the Various Substances Obtained From Trees and Plants, Entering into the Husbandry of Tropical and Sub-tropical Regions, &c.

by P. L. Simmonds

Tea plants grow in luxuriance in the open air, at the Botanical Gardens, at Kew. Mr. Bonynge has seen this plant growing wild in N. lat. 27 deg. 30 min. on hills from three to 500 feet in height, where too, there was an abundance of frost, snow and hail.

Those persons in England who possess tea plants, and who cultivate them for pleasure, should always bear in mind that, even in the tea districts of China, this shrub will not succeed if it be planted in low, wet land; and this is, doubtless, one of the reasons why so few persons succeed in growing it in this country. It ought always to be planted on a warm sloping bank, in order to give it a fair chance of success. If some of the warm spots of this kind in the south of England or Ireland were selected, who knows but that our cottagers might be able to grow their own tea? at all events, they might have the fragrant herb to look upon.

The Dutch made the first movement to break the charm of Chinese monopoly, by introducing and cultivating the tea plant in their rich and fruitful colony of Java. That island lies between the sixth and eighth degrees of south latitude.

In 1828, the first experiment in the cultivation of tea was made in the garden of the Chateau of Burtenzorg, at Java, where 800 plants of an astonishing vigor, served as an encouragement to undertake this culture, and considerable plantations were made in many parts of the island. The first trials did not answer to the expectations, as far as regards the quality of the article, the astringent taste and feeble aroma of which caused the conjecture that the preparation of the leaf, and its final manipulation, are not exactly according to the process used in China. At present tea is cultivated in thirteen Residencies: but the principal establishment, where the final manipulation is made, is in the neighbourhood of Batavia. The tea which Java now furnishes yearly to the markets of the mother country, may be stated at from 200,000 to 300,000 pounds. It is intimated that the government intends to abandon this culture to the industry of private individuals, under the guarantee of equitable contracts.

The mountain range, which runs through the centre of the island, is the most productive, because the tea gardens, extending from near the base, high up the mountains, reach an atmosphere tempered by elevation. The plant escapes the scorching heats of the torrid zone, and finds a climate, by height rather than by latitude, adapted to its nature. But the plant is not confined to lofty ridges. In the plains, the hedges and fences, if one may so call them, are all planted with the tea shrub, which flourish in greater or less perfection throughout the island. But, as has already been intimated, the equatorial latitudes are not the most auspicious for the vigorous growth of a plant that requires a temperature equally removed from the extremes of heat and cold, and the quality of the tea is as much affected by the climate as the growth of the plant. A considerable quantity of tea is annually shipped from Java to Europe; but the extension of the cultivation is no doubt checked by the exceeding fertility of the soil, and its adaptation to the growth of the rich products of tropical regions.

Mr. Jacobson, inspector of tea culture in Java, has published at Batavia a work in three volumes, upon the mode of cultivating this plant, upon the choice of grounds, and the best processes for the preparation and manipulation of the leaves. This book, the fruit of many years of experience and care given to the subject, has been well received by the cultivators who devote themselves to this branch of industry. If, by means of careful experiments and experience, the government succeed in conferring on the island of Java this important branch of commerce, she may hope to obtain brilliant results; at all events, it will open to the country a new source of prosperity and riches.

An interesting account of the tea plants, and the manufacture of tea, will be found in Fortune's "Wanderings in China," in Ball's "Account of the Cultivation and Manufacture of Tea," Boyle's "Illustrations of Himalayan Botany," and his "Productive Resources of India."

From Fortune's "Travels" I take the following extract:—

"There are few subjects connected with the vegetable kingdom which have attracted such a large share of public notice as the tea-plant of China. Its cultivation on the Chinese hills, the particular species of variety which produces the black and green teas of commerce, and the method of preparing the leaves, have always been objects of peculiar interest. The jealousy of the Chinese government in former times, prevented foreigners from visiting any of the districts where tea is cultivated; and the information derived from the Chinese merchants, even scanty as it was, was not to be depended upon. And hence we find our English authors contradicting each other; some asserting that the black and green teas are produced by the same variety, and that the difference in colour is the result of a different mode of preparation; while others say that the black teas are produced from the plant called by botanists Thea Bohea, and the green from Thea viridis, both of which we have had for many years in our gardens in England. During my travels in China since the last war, I have had frequent opportunities of inspecting some extensive tea districts in the black and green tea countries of Canton, Fokien, and Chekiang: the result of these observations is now laid before the reader. It will prove that even those who have had the best means of judging have been deceived, and that the greater part of the black and green teas which are brought yearly from China to Europe and America are obtained from the same species or variety, namely, from the Thea viridis. Dried specimens of this plant were prepared in the districts I have named, by myself, and are now in the herbarium of the Horticultural Society of London, so that there can be no longer any doubt upon the subject. In various parts of the Canton provinces where I have had an opportunity of seeing tea cultivated, the species proved to be the Thea Bohea, or what is commonly called the black tea plant. In the green tea districts of the north—I allude more particularly to the province of Chekiang—I never met with a single plant of this species, which is so common in the fields and gardens near Canton. All the plants in the green tea country near Ningpo, on the islands of the Chusan Archipelago, and in every part of the province which I have had an opportunity of visiting, proved, without an exception, to be Thea viridis. Two hundred miles further to the north-west, in the province of Kiangnan, and only a short distance from the tea hills in that quarter, I also found in gardens the same species of tea. Thus far my actual observations exactly verified the opinions I had formed on the subject before I left England, viz: that the black teas were prepared from the Thea Bohea, and the green from Thea viridis. When I left the north, on my way to the city of Foo-chow-foo, on the river Min, in the province Fokien, I had no doubt that I should find the tea hills there covered with the other species, Thea Bohea, from which we generally suppose the black teas are made; and this was the more likely to be the case as this species actually derives its specific name from the Bohea hills in this province. Great was my surprise to find all the plants on the tea hills near Foo-chow exactly the same as those in the green tea districts of the north. Here were, then, green tea plantations on the black tea hills, and not a single plant of the Thea Bohea to be seen. Moreover, at the time of my visit, the natives were busily employed in the manufacture of black teas. Although the specific differences of the tea plant were well known to me, I was so much surprised, and I may add amused, at this discovery, that I procured a set of specimens for the herbarium, and also dug up a living plant, which I took northward to Chekiang. On comparing it with those which grow on the green tea hills, no difference whatever was observed. It appears, therefore, that the black and green teas of the northern districts of China (those districts in which the greater part of the teas for the foreign market are made) are both produced from the same variety, and that that variety is the Thea viridis, or what is commonly called green tea plant. On the other hand those black and green teas which are manufactured in considerable quantities in the vicinity of Canton, are obtained from the Thea Bohea, or black tea.

In the green tea districts of Chekiang, near Ningpo, the first crop of leaves is generally gathered about the middle of April. This consists of the young leaf buds just as they begin to unfold, and forms a fine and delicate kind of young hyson, which is held in high estimation by the natives, and is generally sent about in small quantities as presents to their friends. It is a scarce and expensive article, and the picking off the leaves in such a young state does considerable injury to the tea plantation. The summer rains, however, which fall copiously about this season, moisten the earth and air; and if the plants are young and vigorous, they soon push out fresh leaves. In a fortnight or three weeks from the time of the first picking, the shrubs are again covered with fresh leaves, and are ready for the second gathering, which is the most important of the season. The third and last gathering, which takes place as soon as new leaves are formed, produces a very inferior kind of tea, which is rarely sent out of the district. The mode of gathering and preparing the leaves of the tea plant is very simple. We have been so long accustomed to magnify and mystify everything relating to the Chinese, that in all their arts and manufactures we expect to find some peculiar practice, when the fact is, that many operations in China are more simple in their character than in most parts of the world. To rightly understand the process of rolling and drying the leaves, which I am about to describe, it must be borne in mind that the grand object is to expel the moisture, and at the same time to retain as much as possible of the aromatic and other desirable secretions of the species. The system adopted to attain this end is as simple as it is efficacious. In the harvest seasons, the natives are seen in little family groups on the side of every hill, when the weather is dry, engaged in gathering tea leaves. They do not seem so particular as I imagined they would have been in this operation, but strip the leaves off rapidly and promiscuously, and throw them all into round baskets, made for the purpose out of split bamboo or ratan. In the beginning of May, when the principal gathering takes place, the young seed-vessels are about as large as peas. These are also stripped off and mixed with the leaves; it is these seed-vessels which we often see in our tea, and which has some slight resemblance to capers. When a sufficient quantity of leaves are gathered, they are carried home to the cottage or barn, where the operation of drying is performed."