ON TEA, COFFEE, CHOCOLATE, AND TOBACCO
English tea-drinking--Story of our tea--Assam
coolies--Manufacture in India and China--Celestial
moisture--Danger of tea--The hermit and his
intelligent goat--Government, coffee and
cafés--Chicory--Chocolate--Aztecs--Kola and its curious
effects--Tobacco--Sir Walter Raleigh--Great emperors
and tobacco--Could we grow tobacco?--Story of a Sumatra
cigar--Danger of young people smoking tobacco.
On every day throughout the year English people drink about 600,000
lb. of tea. That is about 270 tons, which would form, when made into
the beverage, a lake quite large enough to float a man-of-war! No
other civilized nation takes its tea in the reckless way that we do.
Yet our fellow-subjects in Australia drink even more than ourselves.
Almost the whole of this tea is grown in British colonies or
possessions, manufactured by British subjects, and imported in
British ships.
The coolies who work in the tea-gardens of Assam and Ceylon, the
Englishman who manages them, the engineers in Glasgow and Newcastle
who made the machinery, the shipbuilders, shipowners, and crews, are
all fellow-countrymen of those who drink the cup that cheers. Every
sixpence in the £8,000,000, which is our yearly account for tea,
finds its way into the pockets of our fellow-subjects either at home
or abroad.
[Illustration: _Photo_
_Skeen & Co._
WEIGHING THE DAY'S WORK
The women in the Ceylon Tea Gardens bring in their baskets in the
evening. These are then weighed as shown and the labourers paid
accordingly.]
Every one would suppose that a trade like this, which benefits
everybody, would be very carefully fostered by Government.
Far from it, for this is one of those articles that are always being
attacked by Chancellors of the Exchequer, who seem to have a special
ill will against tea.
Indeed, it is so heavily taxed that it is extremely difficult to make
a profit on tea-gardens. Elsewhere in this chapter some other very
curious facts will be found illustrating the extraordinary habits and
methods of the British Government.
The author does not try to explain these facts, but only points them
out; a nation that can manage to exist at all when such things are
done by its Government is a nation to which one is proud to belong.
The Tea-plant is a native of China and Assam. It is a very handsome
shrub resembling a camellia, with dark, glossy, green leaves and
beautiful flowers. It is said to have been used in China about 2700
B.C., and the first plantations in India were made with Chinese seed.
But a Mr. Bruce reported the presence of an indigenous wild tea in
Assam.[57] Three botanists who were sent to investigate the question
suggested that this Assam variety was only the Chinese plant run
wild, and advised the introduction of Chinese seedlings. This was a
very unfortunate mistake, for the wild Assam plant gives much better
results.
[57] Watt, _Economic Dictionary of the Products of India_. This
valuable work of reference should be consulted for interesting
details as to all the plants cited in this chapter.
The jungle is first cut down and cleared away by the native tribes,
with the help of elephants. Then at the right season, i.e. after the
rains begin, the Indian women and coolies go into the plantations.
They carry on their backs a basket supported by a band across the
forehead. These women nip off the first two leaves and a bud with
their finger and thumb and throw them into the basket over their
shoulders. When the basket is full they take it back to the factory,
where their gatherings are weighed. The actual manufacture is, in
India and Ceylon, all performed by machinery. The tea is first
emptied on to trays in a shallow layer: a pound of tea when so spread
out covers more than a square yard. These trays are then placed in a
room which is heated to a high temperature, for "withering." After
six hours it is passed through a machine which "rolls" or gives a
twist to the leaves. It is then "fermented" on cement floors, where
the tea is covered by strips of moist muslin. It is again rolled and
afterwards dried or "fired." The sifting out of the different sorts
or blends, and also the packing of the tea in chests, are done by
machinery.
That is the Indian system of manufacture, in which there is scarcely
any hand-labour.
In China the rolling, and indeed every stage of the process, appears
to be done by hand. It is obvious that in the handling, pattings,
and rollings of the tea by Chinese coolies, "celestial moisture" may
be imparted to it. In spite of this, however, the export of Chinese
tea is steadily diminishing. In the old days, the Liverpool "tea
clippers," fast and beautiful sailing-ships, raced each other home
from China in order to get the first tea upon the market.
Tea is sometimes dangerous, and especially when it is allowed to
stew on the fire for hours at a time. Besides _theine_, which is the
stimulating, active part of it, and which is a bracing tonic to the
nerves, _tannin_ is also found therein. When meat is taken with a
large amount of _tannin_, the latter acts on the meat exactly as it
does on hides in a tanning factory. It forms a substance resembling
leather, which taxes the powers of the strongest digestion.
Once upon a time in those fertile mountains of Abyssinia which have
never yet been explored by the white man, there was a very holy and
pious hermit. He used to live entirely on the milk of a few goats
which he carefully tended with his own hands. One morning he noticed
that one of these goats showed signs of unusual excitement. It was
frisking about, and obviously was exceedingly well pleased with
itself.
That was not a usual experience with the holy recluse, who watched
the animal carefully. He soon discovered that it was in the habit of
grazing on the bright red berries of a very handsome shrub in the
hills. The anchorite tasted those fruits and discovered that he also
became both pleased with himself and somewhat excited.
His disciples soon discovered a brightness and exhilaration, an
unusual "snap," in the good man's sermons, and they watched him and
also discovered _Coffee_!
The author refuses to take the responsibility of more than the
discovery of the above story. Coffee was, however, introduced into
Arabia by the Sheikh Dabhani in 1470. It was taken to Constantinople
about 1554, and about a hundred years later coffee-houses and _cafés_
were regular and habitual daily resorts in London and Paris.
As usual with stimulants of all kinds, the watchful eye of a moral
Government discovered something objectionable in coffee, and Charles
II in 1675 imposed heavy taxes, or rather forbade the use of it
altogether.
There was in 1718 a coffee-plant in the botanical gardens at
Amsterdam, and in that year some of its seeds were sent to Surinam,
in Dutch Guiana. Apparently the millions of shrubs in the enormous
coffee plantations of the New World are all descended from this
particular Amsterdam plant.
This New World coffee is by far the most important supply. Brazil
alone exports about £19,000,000 worth of coffee, and that from the
New World forms about 82 per cent of the total world's production.
The story of coffee in Ceylon is a tragedy. There happened to be in
the jungle a particular fungus (_Hemileia vastatrix_) which got its
living on the leaves of wild plants belonging to the coffee order
(_Rubiaceæ_) and others. When Arabian coffee was introduced, the
fungus began to attack its leaves. The result was the utter ruin of
the industry. It is said that about £15,000,000 was lost by this
_Hemileia_ disease in Ceylon.
The plantations require a great deal of care. The shrubs have to
be carefully pruned, and the preparation of the coffee bean is
not a very easy matter. It is really the seed of a bright red,
fleshy berry. The pulp or flesh has to be removed, and also both
a horny skin, the "parchment," and a thin delicate membrane, the
"silverskin," in which the seed is enclosed. Coffee is not nearly so
much used in Britain as in some other places, and particularly in
Holland, for the Dutch drink about twenty-one pounds per head in the
year, whilst we in Great Britain only use about three-quarters of a
pound.
It is in fact not very easy to make good coffee, and it is absolutely
necessary to grind and roast the beans just before using them. Very
often also too little coffee is used.
Tinned coffee is often adulterated with either Chicory or Endives,
but those are only the two most important impurities, for burnt
sugar, biscuits, locust-beans, date-stones, rye, malt, and other
substances are ground up and mixed with coffee.
The use of chicory is, however, more or less recognized. It is
the roots which are ground up and mixed with it. They contain no
_caffeine_, which is the active part of the coffee bean, and are
quite harmless. At one time chicory was grown in Essex and other
English counties, and was a distinctly profitable crop.
Here again come in the mysterious ways of the British Government.
The cultivation of chicory was absolutely forbidden by the Inland
Revenue Department; but a considerable amount is still grown in
Belgium and is imported to this country. Those who prefer chicory
with their coffee have to pay a heavy duty; but the Belgian farmer
is allowed and the British farmer is forbidden to take up a paying
and profitable industry! The plant is allied to the dandelion. It
occasionally occurs in this country as a weed, and is a rather
striking plant with bright blue flowers.
Another of these useful productions which also suffers from a heavy
duty is Cocoa or Chocolate. There are a great many different plants
called Co Co, or by some name very similar to it. The Cocoanut Palm
furnishes not only the nuts but the fibre or coir enclosing them,
as well as a great many other useful substances. The _cocaine_
used by dentists, and which deadens or stupefies the nerves of
the teeth, is derived from the leaves of a Peruvian shrub, "Coca"
(_Erythroxylan Coca_). These leaves are chewed in the mouth and have
very extraordinary effects, especially on the Indian labourers. They
are a strong nerve stimulus and take away any feeling of hunger or
fatigue. It was by the use of coca leaves that the postmen of the
Inca emperors in Peru were enabled to carry messages at the rate of
150 miles a day. Then again the Cocoes of the West Indian Islands is
a sort of Yam (_Colocasia antiquorum_). Coco-de-mer is the fruit of a
palm common in the Seychelles Islands (_Lodoicea Seychellarum_).
The cocoa which gives the ordinary chocolate and cocoa of the
breakfast table is the seed of a tree (_Theobroma cacao_). The name
is derived from [Greek: theos], god, and [Greek: brôma], food. It may
be translated, "That which the gods browse upon."
This plant is one of those which were cultivated by that ancient,
powerful, semi-civilized nation, the Aztecs of Mexico. They have
almost entirely vanished; at any rate their descendants, if they have
any, exercise practically no influence in the world, but they have
left us chocolate. They fully appreciated the plant, and even more
than we do, for they worshipped it with grateful and superstitious
awe.
In their tombs, chocolate flavoured with vanilla was placed, in order
to provide the ghost with sufficient sustenance for his or her aerial
flight to the Land of the Sun. Columbus brought home some cocoa
on his return from his first voyage. The Jesuit fathers in Mexico
greatly helped in developing the plantation of cocoa in the days of
the Spaniards. At present the largest amount comes from Ecuador,
which produces about 50,000,000 pounds weight.
It is a small tree, twenty to thirty feet high, growing in the warm,
moist, and sheltered forests of Central and South America. It has
a large fruit, within which are the numerous cocoa beans, "nibs,"
or seeds. The tree does not bear until it is five years old. The
fermentation and drying of the beans require some care.
[Illustration: _Stereo Copyright, Underwood & Underwood_
_London & New York_
A TOBACCO PLANTATION IN CUBA]
Chocolate is made from the powdered cocoa mixed with sugar and other
materials. Chocolate, like tea and coffee, depends for its effect
on an extremely powerful drug, _theine_ or _caffeine_, of which it
contains minute proportions. There are very few other plants known
which possess this powerful substance. Amongst these is the Kola nut,
which is everywhere regularly employed in West Africa. On the way up
to the barracks at Freetown, Sierra Leone, natives were always to be
seen seated by the roadside; they sold kola nuts to the soldiers, who
were thereby enabled to walk steadily and uprightly past the sentry,
and to return his challenge in a clearly articulate voice, although
they might previously have been somewhat injudiciously convivial in
the town. This kola is one of the very strongest nerve tonics; under
its influence men can endure severe physical and mental strain.
Like the others, however, a depressing reaction inevitably follows,
accompanied by insomnia, headache, and other evil effects.
When one comes to ask, Why do those few plants out of all the vast
multitude of the vegetable world possess such extraordinary virtues?
it is difficult to find an answer. Possibly some obscure insect or
fungus enemy finds _caffeine_ poisonous.
Nor can one find any reason for the curious properties developed in
the Tobacco leaf by fermentation, except a possible protection to
the leaf from the attacks of insects. No doubt the leaf, even in its
natural state, would be too strong for them.
Tobacco is a native of Central America. The name _Nicotiana tabacum_
is derived (the first) from a certain Jean Nicot, Ambassador to the
King of Portugal, and the second from the Haytian name for a pipe.
On Columbus's voyage in 1492 the use of tobacco was noted. The story
of Sir Walter Raleigh's servant, who threw a bucket of water over
his master when the latter was smoking a pipe, is not supported by
much evidence, but it seems to be probable that Sir Walter did smoke
his pipe on the way to the scaffold.
At any rate it was cultivated in Europe by the year 1570, and Spenser
speaks of the "soveraine Weed, divine Tobacco."
From the first it was detested by all governments and authorities.
James I published a very intemperate _Counterblast against Tobacco_.
It was prohibited by the Czar of Russia in 1635, and by the King of
France. The great Sultan Jehanghir in India, Sultan Amurath II in
Turkey, Shah Abbas the Great in Persia, and the Emperor Kang Ching
in China, all prohibited the use of tobacco in their respective
dominions.
Yet none of these great rulers were able to check its progress. The
"Herb of Amiability," or the "Queen Herb of the rude Barbarian" as it
is described in Chinese, prevails almost over the whole earth. There
is scarcely a people or tribe in existence which does not use it.
But almost everywhere it is either heavily taxed or a Government
monopoly; in the latter case it is always exceedingly bad. We
ourselves import tobacco worth about £4,500,000 in the year, and
pay a heavy duty. The world probably smokes from 1,800,000,000 to
2,000,000,000 pounds of tobacco every year.
The plant is a very pretty one, with large leaves and long pinky or
white flowers, which are open and strongly scented at night. It is
an annual, and is not at all difficult to cultivate. There is an
impression in this country that it is a tropical plant, but by far
the greatest amount of our tobacco comes from temperate countries.
Large quantities are grown in Germany, in Hungary, and in other parts
of Europe. As a matter of fact tobacco was once cultivated in both
England and Scotland.
There is evidence to show that in 1832 it was successfully grown in
Roxburghshire, where 1000 pounds an acre was obtained. The land was
let at about £5 to £6 per acre. Experiments of recent years have also
proved very encouraging, and in fact it is difficult to see how any
reasonable doubt can exist as to the fact that it would be perfectly
easy to grow plenty of that sort of tobacco which we now obtain from
Holland and Germany. A prominent Irish statesman has admitted this:
"There was no doubt but that tobacco could be grown in Ireland, but
whether there are Irishmen patriotic enough to smoke it, _is_ very
doubtful."[58]
[58] Wrightson, _Journal R. Agr. Soc._, Second Series, vol. 10,
part ii. p. 312; Jenkins, _Ibid._, vol. 11, part i. p. 192; De
Lanne, _Ibid._, vol. 23, part i. p. 213. Carter, _Tobacco in
England_.
Of course every one knows that the differences in tobacco depend
chiefly on the preparation, but the _Constitutional_ objection to
tobacco, illustrated by the above remark, is the real reason why it
is not grown.
Oliver Cromwell sent his troopers to ride down the growing crops.
Charles II imposed a penalty of £1600 per acre. Modern statesmen are
flippant and unfair.
The reason of course is that a large income is cheaply obtained by
taxing imported tobacco. If this were at all interfered with, new
taxes, which would certainly be unpopular, would be required.
There is a good deal of interest in the story of the tobacco
plantations. Many prisoners of the Civil War in England were sold to
Virginia and other places. Even nowadays there is some romance in
the history of a cigar. In the Dutch island of Sumatra the jungle is
cleared away by the natives under the orders of an English manager.
Chinese coolies are then imported. The estate provides each coolie
with tools, tea, a barber, and sufficient cash to buy rice, fish, or
pork, as well as a little over for his opium, to spend in fireworks,
and to propitiate his demons.
The coolie grows the tobacco, which is bought from him and
manufactured by the estate. Some of it goes to India, where it is
used as the outer wrapper of cigars.[59]
[59] Dunning, _Tobacco_, 1876.
For adulterating tobacco all sorts of leaves are occasionally
employed, such as those of the dock, chicory, burdock, foxglove,
comfrey, elm, coltsfoot, plantain, beech, cabbage, lettuce (steeped
in tar oil), etc., etc.
The substance nicotine is a deadly and dangerous poison. When young
people smoke tobacco, it has been quite conclusively proved that they
will very probably not reach their full growth, but be miserable
weaklings, stunted, half-developed, and below the proper standard of
a man.
This is not surprising, if one reflects on the constitution of
tobacco smoke. This contains "nicotine, empyreumatic resin,
oil, ammonia, carbonic acid, carbonic oxide, hydrocyanic acid,
sulphuretted hydrogen, carburetted hydrogen, and paraffin."[60]
[60] _Journal Society of Arts_, March, 1896.