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 as wild Beasts do in a Forrest, it is probable that those Animals, upon drying of a Tea Leaf, are dried too, and become hard, and are seemingly dead, as Swallows are in Winter; but when they are put into hot Water, they come to life again, and being taken along with the Water into a Lady's Mouth, they irritate the Nerves of her Tongue, and cause some Uneasiness in that Member, which makes it then so apt to defame others. He then desir'd me to consider the Fineness of a Lady's Body, and how apt we are to give ill Language when we are vex'd. He added, that the Water might sometimes be so hot, as to kill those Animals, which he took for a Reason why sometimes a Pot of Tea might be drank without Scandal. A third was of Opinion, that it was the Voices of those Animals being scalded with the hot Water, which we took for Scandal, tho' it was not, and desir'd me to consider how apt we were to be deceiv'd in many things, and why not in this? I must confess, that these Gentlemen have learnedly accounted for it, but not to my Satisfaction: For granting that there were such Animals upon Leaves, why do not those upon Tobacco produce the same Effect, or why may we not hear those upon Tea Leaves roar before they get into a Lady's Mouth? Surely none wou'd be so unmannerly as to blame a Lady for the crying of an Animal so hard to be seen.

But the best Account I cou'd meet with, is founded upon the Relation which is given by the Natives of the Country where Tea grows; they say that this Plant was at first held in no more Esteem than common Bushes, and that the Leaves of it were never us'd, if they were us'd at all, but as Saw-dust or Chaff, 'till it happen'd once that a certain Animal among them, remarkable for its Pride and Ill-nature, came to shelter it self from the Heat of the Sun under this Shrub (they call the Animal Namow) where, as it lay a long Time secur'd from the Heat, it had an Inclination to put forth its Excrement; or to express the Matter more cleanly,