Morning journal and courier., 1890-03-24
The stun Offered To Callers.

IFrom The Washington Post.l
 A long lost cousin, who has lived in China for the last twenty years engaged in the tea trade, came home last fall and was dragged on to Washington by some female relative to whom man of leisure was rara avis. They took it upon themselves to enter tain him and fill up his idle hours, and with the beginning of the year they took him the rounds of official calls, and kept at 1t until he cried for mercy. Of course his training and his wonderful acuteness and judgment in teas caused him to watch critically the processes gone through with at the different tea tables and to examine the infusions of fered the afternoon caller. The sum of his observations was given to fellow''tea man" whom ne encountered at hotel the other night; s!N;,u :, :, ,uo,s..e,, sou .s... n.on,. here live" said he, 'after you know what awful slop and stuff they drink. It is a marvel that they have sound stomach or nerve among them. Hundreds of these women go around from house to house every afternoon and drink, three and four cups of the worst tea in the market. If 1t is not Oo1ong, or the more deadly Annoy Oolong, it is straight green tea, or sometimes green and Oolong mixed, and not the first crop and quality at that. made it a point to test the tea at every place we went the first few days, just to get an idea of what the best custom in America demanded. Ex- cept at two high officials houses it was bad tea to start with, and generally stale and bit ter from standing an hour or 30 before l came along.
 "Now, here's the way they do it. The tea ia kept in any sort of loose canister or caddy instead of air tight, so that half of it's strength and aroma is gone before they touch the leaves of the teapot. Colley Cibber | said that no woman knew how to make tea until he taught how, and Colley Cibber had never been to America. A pretty girl in pretty gown is put down before the tea tray l and straightway dumps enough tea into the l teapot to serve for dozen persons. Some- I times the water in the kettle is boiling, and sometimes it is not, when she fills the teapot up. From the one pot of sea she pours all l afternoon, putting fresh leaves in on the stale one, until the tea is nearly filled up with leaves, aad the stuff poured out is as deadly 1 as Jersey lightning.
 1 "The very idea is disgusting. You | wouldn't offer a man stale beer, nor stale 1 eggs, nor cold potatoes, but this stewed-ovel l and long-ssanding dregs of tea is far worse
 than either. Whether it is ignorance o, economy I cannot say, but that thing goes or
 at every tea-table I've seen; the sweet | cr6atuE6 putting Ifesu loafeS III ou up ol the dead ones and pouring on hot water untl
 the last caller goes. If were 8 woman go ing around, and were wanting 8 decent fresf I cup of tea, would furnish a few extra tea pots to these hostesses, SO that there would
 be fresh pot of tea every half hour in a day
 although I'm not fond of the cheever lea
 when 1t has been infused any over tel minutes.
 "At one place where we called they asked
 us if we would have tea, and the younl
 woman walked over to a side table where
 spirit lamp and actually poured the tea iron
 that zinc-lined kettle that had been boilin l no one knows how long. It was the worst o Oolong at the beginning, and 1t was some
 thing more deadly than strychnine when
 inhaled little of it-not aroma but mias matic and noxious vapor. would nc have swallowed ten drops of the stuff fo
 $1OO.
 sAt another house girl in very fetchin red gown asked me If would have Russia [ tea.
 f "Oh it's just tea with lemon in it. y l. "So that makes it Russian9 We'll pra tell me what kind of tea is 1t when 1t he a cream and sugar in itF
 Q 'That must be English tea ..
 "At the next place pretty thing wit blue eyes asked sweetly: "sWon't you have some samovar teaF # "'What in the world is thatT |. "sOh. it's made in samovar like the Ru # sians make it.
 ~ "Shades of Dharmal they really vera n l. making it in the brass samovar, but I shou le have besn it no way surprised to have four l. 1t 50.
 .sAt still another place young wom'
 crushingly informed me that it was re 0, Russian tea that she was pouring. A friel