Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 23.djvu/114

Rh previously obtained by the Company’s factors having been purchased in Madras and Surat, whither it was brought by Chinese junks after the expulsion of the British from Java. During the closing years of the century the amount brought over seems to have been, on the average, about 20,000 lb a year. The instructions of 1700 directed the supercargoes to send home 300 tubs of the finer green teas and 80 tubs of bohea. In 1703 orders were given for “75,000 Ib. Singlo (green), 10,000 lb imperial, and 20,000 lb bohea.” The average price of tea at this period was 16s. per lb.

During the 100 years from 1710 to 1810 the aggregate sale of tea by the East India Company amounted to 750,219,016 lb, worth £129,804,595, of which 116,470,675 lb was re-exported. The duties during that century (excepting a period of eleven years, 1784-95, when they were only 12 per cent.) were excessive, amounting to about 200 per cent. on the value of common teas. The results of so enormous a tax were the creation of a gigantic smuggling trade, extensive adulteration of imported teas, and much fabrication of counterfeit tea within the country. Probably the duty-paid tea did not represent more than half what was consumed under the name of tea. The following table exhibits the principal facts connected with the trade during the period of the Company’s monopoly, which terminated on the. 22d of April 1834, when the trade was thrown open to all, the prices quoted being those of good qualities in the Company’s warehouse or in bond:—

The progressive increase in the consumption of tea in the United Kingdom during 50 years from 1836 till 1886 is instructively shown in the accompanying diagram constructed by Messrs J. C. Sillar and Co., of London. The dotted line represents the average monthly consumption in each year; the fluctuations in price of good sound congou are traced by the black line; and the years in which reduced customs duty came into operation are indicated along the base. From 1860 onwards the amount of Indian tea entered for home consumption is shown in monthly average by a black column. This column brings out the remarkable fact that the Indian tea consumed in the United Kingdom in a year now exceeds the total consumption of all kinds in 1860, and is more than double the whole quantity used fifty years ago. The following table shows the growth of the British tea trade for five years ending 1885:—

The consumption of tea in the United Kingdom per head was in 1840 1·22 lb, which increased in 1850 to 1·86 lb; in 1860 it reached 2·67 lb, in 1870 3·81 Ib, in 1880 4·06 Ib, and now (1887) it is about 5 lb.

Next to the United Kingdom, the greatest tea-importing nation is the United States. Notwithstanding that tea has from 1873 been duty free (duty 25 cents per lb in 1870, 17·72 in 1871, and 15 in 1872), the habit of tea drinking does not grow in America as it is found to do in the British Isles, as is shown by the accompanying table.

Of the 72,104,956 lb of tea imported into the United States in the year ended June 1885, 35,895,835 Ib was Chinese, 32,156,032 came from Japan, and 3,540,148 Ib came from England. Nearly 6,000,000 Ib was re-exported, principally to Canada.

Next to the English, the Dutch are the greatest consumers of tea outside of China; and the only other considerable tea-using nation is Russia. The following table gives the amount of tea imported in the year 1884 by the principal tea-drinking countries:—

By this table the Australian colonists come out as the most inveterate tea-drinkers in the world. The quantity received by Holland in 1884 was 2,250,000 Ib less than the imports of 1883, but the average of recent times has been 4,500,000 lb.

The quantity consumed in China has been estimated as high as 2000 millions of pounds annually, being at the rate of a little more than 6 Ib per head of the population; and, considering the tea-drinking habits of the people, the estimate is by no means extravagant. In this light it may be safe to affirm that the amount of tea used yearly throughout the world reaches the gigantic total of 2500 millions of pounds.

Bibliography.—The literature of tea is very copious but much scattered. The following works may be named: — Bontekoe, Tractat van het excellenste Kruyd Thee, The Hague, 1679; Sylvestre Dufour, Traités Nouveaux et Curieux du Café, du Thé, et du Chocolat, 2d ed., Lyons, 1688 (translation of 1st edition by John Chamberlayne, London, 1685; translations also in Spanish and Latin); J. G. Houssaye, Monographie du Thé, Paris, 1843; Robert Fortune, Three Year' Wanderings in China, London, 1847; Id., A Journey to the Tea Countries of China, London, 1852; S. Ball, Tea Cultivation in China, London, 1848; J. J. L. L. Jacobson, Handboek voor de Kultuur en Fabrikatie van Thee, 3 vols., 1843; S. A. Schwarzkopf, Die narkotischen Genussmittel—i. Der Thee, Halle, 1881; Lieut.-Col. E. Money, Cultivation and Manufacture of Tea, 3d ed., London, 1878; F. T. R. Deas, Young Tea Planter's Companion, London, 1886. See also parliamentary papers and official publications of Indian Government; ''Jour. Roy. Asiatic Soc.; Jour. Agri. and Horti. Soc. of India; Soc. of Arts Journ., &c''.