The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1905-05-04
MANY VARIETIES Of TEA
Differences in Products a Mat
ter of Careful Preparation.
FEW VARIETIES OF PLANT
Utmost Skill Required In Conducting
the Withering, Drying, Coloring
and Perfuming Process--No Ma
chinery in This Industry-Best
Teas Prepared by Oldest Workers.

and Perfuming Process--No Ma.
chinery in This Industry-Best
Teas Prepared by Oldest Workers.
Tea growing is one field of agri-
culture where modern machinery has
no place. 1t is essentially an indus
try where everything must be done
by hand. The only place where i'm
proved agricultural implements could
be used is in the plowing, but as tea
is grown mostly on rough and rocky
hillsides, nothing but the simplest
implements can be used.
The variety of tea depends on its
preparation, its age when gathered, or
upon foreign plants and flowers mix
ed with it to give fragrance. Young
Hyson, Hyson and Hyson skin teas all
grow on the same plants, yet there
is as much difference between Hyson
and Hyson skin as there is between
the finest silk and the coarsest hemp.
Americans and most Europeans drink
tea that would not be tolerated by
people of wealth and rank in China
and Japan.
The distinctive quality Of q tea
comes largely from methods that are
used to perfume it. In some teas,
richly perfumed flowers are mixed
with tea leaves all through the dry
ing and fermenting process to give
it a sweet fragrance. Pouchong tea,
which is immensely popular with
many epicnres, is nothing but a scent
ed Oolong Four different varieties
ofhowers are used in giving it the
fragrant odor that has made it so pop
ular. Every little tea leaf is gather
ed by hand, the leaves are carefully
assorted and much painstaking labor
is applied to every pound Of tea that
comes to the market.
The plants at maturity reach a
height of from 1 foot three inches to
3 feet, according to variety. There
are eight varieties cultivated in For
mosa. In that Japanese island tea
culture was unknown until about a
century ago, when it was introduced
from China, Formosa then being
Chinese possession. In appearance a
tea plant Is more like the rosemary
of our old-fashioned gardens than any
other familiar plant. 1t is also much
like the sage. The plants are consid-
cred old enough to yield leaves in
the fourth year after transplantinug.
After they are thirteen years old they
are pruned carefully for three years.
The leaves are gathered during
seven months of the year, from April
until November. Only the young ter.
minal leaves are taken, nipped by
hand, three or four at a time, with
the greatest care. The tea is known
as winter tea" autumn tea,v sum
mer tea," or Spring tea," according
to the season in which the leaves are
gathered
Tea plantations vary in size from a
very few square yards to 120 square
miles. About 1000 pounds of green
leaves is the usual yield per acre.
These leaves when dried make about
$50 pounds of tea ready for the pot
Oolong tea is placed on a canvas mat
and exposed to dry in the sun direct
ly after gathering. This is the first
withering. After short time in the
sun they undergo another withering
process in bamboo trays placed in a
room. After this they are poured in
to vessels called kamwo, the leaves
are subjected TO third and last
softening before being heated in pans.
This softening is intended to per-
fume the tea by the slight fermenta-
tion which is engendered. This seems
simple process, but it requires the
greatest skill. Tea is made good or
bad according to the skill used There
are two stages of the pan-heating
which follows the last whitening Up
on leaving the heated pans, the tea is
dried in three stages over a carefully
regulated fire.
The color of the tea depends upon
the process used In whitening and
drying. The utmost skill has to be
used in all the stages OF preparation.
Tea workers of the fields are not
necessarily skilled in their tasks, but
in the process of drying, coloring and
perfuming it requires man who has
had years of experience. The best
J teas are prepared by men who have
grown old at their work