A Cup of Tea [pp. 371-375]

A CUP OF TEA.
kopf knows, and Horace shows, people put malobathron on their hair, not in their stomachs.
Ramusio, a Venetian writer on geography, who
died in I557, mentions tea; and so does Giovanni Botero, who, in I589, particularly praises
tea as a "delicate juice which takes the place
of wine, and is good for health and sobriety;"
so, also, does Olearius, whom the Duke of
Holstein sent to Russia and Persia. Gerard
Bontius, a Leyden professor who invented
diabolical pills known as "Tartarean," and
went to China in I648, gave a drawing of the
plant. We hear of tea in Europe in I557the last year of the reign of Queen Mary-and
yet it was not till I66o-the year of the Restoration-that we find tea in pretty free use in
England.
In I66o I2 Carl. 2, c. 23-a duty of eightpence a gallon was laid on all tea sold and
made in coffee-houses-started in London by
Pasqua Rosee, I652. The tax-collectors visited
the houses daily, to ascertain what quantity of
tea had been made in the day. That same year
Thomas Garraway, landlord of Garraway's Coffee-House, near the Royal Exchange, started
as "tobacconist, and seller, and retailer of tea
and coffee." "That the virtues and excellencies
of this leaf and drink," said Garraway in a
circular, "are many and great, is evident and
manifest by the high esteem and use of itespecially of late years-among the physicians
and knowing men of France, Italy, Holland,
and other parts of Christendom; in England it
hath been sold in the leaf for six pounds, and
sometimes for ten pounds, the pound weight;
and in respect of its former scarceness and
dearness, it hath been only used as a regalia in
high treatments and entertainments, and presents made thereof to princes and grandees, till
the year i657. The said Thomas Garraway did
purchase a quantity thereof, and first publicly
sold the said tea in leaf and drink made according to the directions of the most knowing mierchants and travelers in those eastern countries,
and upon knowledge and experience of the said
Garraway's continued care and industry in ob taining the best tea, and making the best tea,
and making drink thereof, very many noblemen,
physicians, and merchants, and gentlemen of
quality, have ever since sent to him for the said
leaf, and daily resort to his house in Exchange
Alley aforesaid, and drink the drink thereof;
and to this intent, etc., these are to give notice
that the said Thomas bath tea to sell fiom six teen to fifty shillings the pound." Fifty shillings
the pound, forsooth; and now we get good Sou chong, that deadly enemy to beer and wine, at
three shillings a pound.
Soon after this Pepys, that rarest of gossips,
whose curiosity for novelties was insatiable, mentions tasting tea in September, I66o. "Tea-a
Chinese drink, of which I had never drank before." But it does not seem to have made much
impression on the worthy admiralty clerk, for in
I667 he says again, "Came in and found my
wife making tea, a new drink which is said to be
good for her cold and defluxions." The Earl
of Clarendon, that grand party historian, writes
in his diary, "Pare Couplet dined with me, and
after supper we had tea; which he said was really as good as any he had drank in China."
Sir Kenelm Digby mentions with great emotion
a way of preparing tea used by the Jesuits when
coming in tired and waiting for a meal.
"The priest that came from China," hle says,
"told Mr. Waller that to a pint of tea they frequently take the yolks of two new-laid eggs, and
beat them up with as much fine sugar as is sufficient for the tea, and stir all well togethler. The
water must remain upon- the tea no longer than
while you can say the Miserere psalm very leisurely; you have then only the spiritual part of
the tea, the proportion of whlichl to the water
must be about a drachm to a pint."
In I688 the Court of Directors, writing to
their factory agents at Bantam, in Java, ordered
them to send back home one hundred pounds
weight of the best tea they could get, and the
next year there arrived their first consignment
of tea, in two canisters of one hundred and
forty-three pounds and a half each. The directors had previously presented Charles's Portuguese queen, who had learned to like the Chinese beverage at home, on the shores of the
Tagus, with twenty-two pounds of tea on her
birthday. It was on this presentation that
courtly Waller wrote his verses:
"Venus her Myrtle, Plhcebus has his Bays,
Tea both excels, which she vouchsafes to praise;
Tihe best of queens and best of herbs we owe
To that bold nation which the way did show
To the first region where the sun dothl rise,
Whose rich productions we so justly prize.
The muse's friend, tea, dotls our fancy aid,
Repress those vapors which the head invade,
And keeps that palace of the soul serene,
Fit on her birthday to salute the queen."
Nicholas Tulp, the same eminent Professor
of Amsterdam, whom Rembrandt painted with
his pupils gathered round him over the dissect ing-table, had already, about I670, written on
tea, and collected opinions of eminent physicians
on the subject of the new liquor. But in I671
tea found a champion indeed, in Cornelius Bon tekoe, a Leyden doctor, who upheld the chem ical theory of Dubois, and considered tea a pan acea against all the ills that flesh is heir to. He
pronounced it an infallible cause of health, and
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