The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-12-31
TEA AND ITS USE
When First Imported by Europe.a
The Future OF Forraosa.

It is 1913 years since the famous tea party
IN Boston Harbor occurred and since that
timst the consumption of the fragrant
Oriental leaf has increased from few
hundred thousand pounds to last years
Importation OF over 100, 600 600 pounds for
the United States and Canada. The IN
dusury demands the constant use of many
sailing and steam vessels and the great
am is to bring the tea from China's and
Japan's fields to the Occidental tables as
quickly as possible. The consumer de-
mands his tea as fresh as possible and
the man who has 1t on hand Is never so
happy as when he has disposed of it safe
and sound to the retail merchant, thus
relieving himself of all worry of damage
by water, fire or neglect. Thus 1t is that
twenty days after 1t has left Yokohama
it has been lnloaded al Tacoma and start
ed safely ON its way East
The fact that at the equator the degrees
OF longitude are over sixty miles apart
and that this distance lessons as the poles
are approached has done much toward
making Tacoma even a greater rece5y-
ing port for China and Japan's product to
that San Francisco, fer the sailing charts
snow a decrease of $50 miles in the route
to the northern city, and thus the cargo
reaches Tacoma quicker than II does the
city in California. 1t is a difference of
only twenty-four hours, but this merely
shows the great speed demanded in the
getting of the tea into the market. New
Rork ranks third as a tea-entry port, but
the route across the Pacific promises to
be even a more popular track from the
Eastern countries after Japan opens up
her extensive steamship lines, ships for.
which she IS building at present to enter
the commerce of the world.
"a The history Of the Earl of Macartney's S
Embassy TO China says that early in the
seventeenth century some Dutch adven-
turers seeking for some objects as might
fetch price in China and hearing of the
general usage there of a beverage from q
plant Of the country, beth0ugllt them
selves of trying how far European plant
of supposed great virtues might be RELISH
ed by the Chinese and thereby become a
saleable commodity among them, and ac-
cordingly introduced TO them the herb
sage, once so extolled by the Salernian
school of physics as a powerful preServa-
turn the Chinese tea, which they brought
10 Europe" The English East Indian
Company imported one hundred pounds
of tea in 1853 and kept the monopoly of
had traded with China for tea since the.
seventeenth century, commencing by 60
ing overland by the way of Siberia. The
first American ship to go to China arr
rived in the land of the Celestials in 1884.
In the general way Americans use green
tea more than do their English brothers,
who are devoted to the black variety.
This accounts for the fact that the United
which produces very little of the darker
qualities. DR.. Edward Bedlce, of Phiia-
delpf1ia, ex-Consul to Annoy China pre-
diets that the island of Forrnosa, under
the japanese Government, Will soon put
out the best teas in the world, and that
the product of this island, which form-
erly sent its tea to Annoy and Hong Kong
before shipping it on to the western mar
kets, win soon ship directly from its own
ports.
English and American tea buyers say
that It is almost impossible to secure the
best teas, as the Russians watch the pro-
ducticn OF the finest qualities and pay
fabulous prices for the kinds they want.
The official classes OF Russia are said to-
tea which they particularly prefer-an
almost white quality, which has peculiar
oil-l.ke flavor. which is not at all relished
by foreigners. Chicago News.