The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-11-27
EXPENSIVE TEA.
1t Cost Three Hundred and Forty
Dollars for Single Pound.

cost Three Hundred and Forty
Dollars for Single Pound.
From the St. Louis Globe Democrat
Tea at $S4O pound is @ luxury not
many families could afford as a steady
beverage" said Harold WeddIe. OF
London. at the Southern hotel last
night. Fabulous as the statement
may seem, this enormous price was
paid for tea in the London market a
comparatively short time ago But
then 1T was wonderful tea, the like OF
which had never before been seen.
IL was tea whose price represented the
sacrifice of the best part Of a human
life. To produce it the light of a pair
Oh human eyes was extinguished. To
understand the nature of this Won
derful tea it is necessary to know some
or the peculiarities of the tea leaf In
its native state The tip OF each leaf
is differently constituted from the re-
mainder of the leaf When the leaf
Is dried out it becomes black all but
the tip, which changes from green to
a beautiful golden color. The golden
tip is almost inf1nitesimal In size, and
usually loses its identity in the black
mixture that results from the final
process Of teamaking
The high-priced tea I told you of
was made by a Ceylon planter, who
cherished an ambition to place upon
the market a tea whose beauty of APP
pearance and richness of flavor would
make him famous. His name I can
not remember, and probably If I did I
could not pronounce 1t. His idea was
to separate the golden tips from the
leaves and pack them separately. He
would trust no one else with his pre-
cious secret, and undertook the task
himself 1t was tremendous under
taking, for it must be remembered
that the tip had to be separated from
each leaf by hand, and 1t required
great care to prevent some of the
black tea from finding IT'S way into
the precious golden mixture.
'"rhe planter worked day and night
until he had fifty pounds of the golden
tips and was blind as a bat. He sacri-
feed his eyesisht to his ambition. The
news Of the fifty pounds Of wonderful
golden tea got to London, as news Of
commercial import always does, and
there was hot rivalry among the tea
brokers to get possession Of the new
mixture. In London tea can be sold,
TO brokers only at auction, and the
general public is excluded from the
sales, only brokers being admitted. This
insures a proper valuation, as the COM
petition between the brokers is close.
When this particular tea was put up
IL seemed as IL the DlQulHB WOulU new
err cease, and 1t did not until the Won
derful product was sold at 1910 q
pound, or 81. 900 for the fifty-pound lot.
Considering that the like of ii would
probably never again be obtainable, I
do not think the price was eZtrava-
CANT, as was shown when the tea was
retailed. IT was sold to connoisseurs
in all parts of the world, and in each
instance at handsome profit. The
Indian planter received a handsome
sum from his brokers, though millions
would have been scant consolation to
him in his sightless condition.
~ do not think any of the tea cane
to America. The highest price paid
for tea IN this country, so far as l
was $50 a pound This tea
was the product of a Ceylon planta-
ton, and was peculiar in that 1t had
been so cultivated that a considerable
portion of each leaf had the golden
color so much so that the mixture re-
suIting was beautiful black and gold.
It was undoubtedly of fine flavor, as
can attest, for I was so fortunate as
to taste some of it. Americans are be-
greater tea drinkers every
year but the Irish are still the heaviest
tea consumers in the world"