The Portland daily press., 1871-12-25
THE PR ESS,
MONDAY MORNING, DEC. a5, 1871.
Introduction Of Coffee into Eurone-

When the new favorite had tbus oono,o.oa
the East, it soon found its wav to Euroro :,
so. The precise manner in which the victory
was achieved is not known, since, like all had
habits, the custom of drinking coffee BEGAN in
different parts of the Occident at once. and
grew in strength mainly by dint of persecu-
ton, Ellis considered it likely that the vene-
tians, whose dominions were so near the
Turkish empire, and who then almost monop-
olized the trade with the Levant, were the
first to introduce it; at least Venetian mer-
chant, De la Vale, wrote in 1915 from Con-
stantinople that he should bring his CORES
pondent some coffee, which he believed was
thing unknown in his country. An Ausburg
physician, Rauwolt, had, however, some forty
years before written a public account of the
strange black beverage which he had drunk
IN Aleppo; and an Italian, Prosper Alpinus,
mad In 1851 seen the plant itself in a green
house In Cairo. Whoever may have the mer-
II OF having first brought the bean to Europe,
retro de la Vale was certainly the
owner OF the first public coffee-house in
Europe. He opened one in Rome in 1926.
aithough his countrymen had sold the bean
tneh already for eleven years. A Frenchman.
Mervllle, did the same in 1914 for Marseilles'
The first cup of coffee had been drunk in par
is at the house of a great Eastern traveller.
ThevenOt, who had brought the bean and a
great fondness for it home with him from the
East; still he and his friends were the only
persons who enjoyed its pleasant effects for
many year. 1t was only in 1869 that Soil
man Aga, the ambassador of Sultan Mahmud
w., made the use of coffee more general At
the first audience he had of Louis XIV. he
took occasion to mention the subject, and ev-
er afterward made il a point to treat his visit
Ors to the OrthQdex beverage of his native
land. At Sign from their master, black
slaves in bright turbans and sky-blue gowns
entered, holding upon small silk cushion
costly cup of finest porcelain, poised in lar
ger cup OF silver or gold fiigree, and offered it
on their knees to the visitor their lord chose
to honor. The new fashion took amazingly;
the minister's house became immensely pop
ular, and all the elite of society crowded his
salons to enjoy the bitter black draught.
When the liberal Turk left Paris the taste
had become so general that an Armenian,
Paschal, opened large coffee house in 1872,
although he had to suffer most dangerous
competition from Sicilian, Procope, who
offered the delightful beverage in the streets
OF the city at very low rate, notwithstand-
ing the the price of coffee was then forty dol
lars pound. Henceforth coffee houses
sprang up in all the fashionable portions of
the city, and became the meeting places of
the great world of artists and scholars, LAYING
thus the foundation to the custom which
makes now these houses the resort of nearly
the whole OF the male population of South
ern Europe, who spend there the largest por-
tion of the day. Then duchesses and count
esses would drive up in splendid equipages to
to drink their cup of coffee without alighting;
poets there read their productions; authors
exchanged criticisms; actors and actresses
were praised and condemned, and even diplo-
mats and great generals met there to discuss
the greatest questions of state. The lively
French mind was so much pleased with the
gently stimulating beverage that they called it
the drink for the mind, par excellence, and
ascribed to it universally the power of cheer
ing the melancholy and of soothing great
grief. Hence, when lady at court received
sad news of her husbands sudden death, she
exclaimed in her anguish, ''Woe is me
Bring me a cup of eoffeer'
London owed its first acquaintance with
coffee to a caprice. 1t seems that in 1852 a
wealthy Turkey merchant, MI. Edwards, had
brought home with him from his Eastern
travels not only fondness for coffee, but
also Greek woman called Pasqua, whom he
had bOughtin Smyrna, and whom he now en-
ployed to serve the cup of coffee in Oriental
manner to his guests. The latter, however,
soon came in such crowds, to enjoy the bev-
erage, or to admire the Greek beauty, that
the merchant could endure it no longer; he
therefore married the Smyrniote to his coach
man, and advanced them sufficient sum of
money to establish coffee house in ST.
Michaers Alley. The cup of coffee became
in England also very soon universal favorite.
Coffee house 'prang up everywhere, and
were soon the Il rt of the quidnucs of the
day; and the beal tself was so largely i'm
hessy dahss dtahsc abas possea posea uGaeF'eah new
article of commerce. From ga Cup of Cof-
fee," by SCHELE De WE'RE, in Harper's
Magazine for January.