Page:Letters of Life.djvu/196

184 but quickly with hatchets brake all the boxes, and what was therein cast they into the sea, and so departed.

Then were the deep waters blackened by the color of the tea, and the fishes affrighted. And those who had knowledge of that hidden realm did say, that the sharks who disported themselves in that tea-tank were quiet for a season, and the dolphins slept a great sleep.

Moreover, Neptune, when he beheld the darkening of the deep, shook his trident, saying in wrath, "Wherefore is this waste?" Moreover, he complained that this had not been made known unto him; for he would have bidden sundry of the sea-gods, who had been civil unto him, to a tea-party.

So the men who had thrown into the sea this great store of the Chinese plant, turned and went every man unto his own home, ere the morning dawn. And when the sun arose, certain of their wives did question them, saying: "Why tarried ye so long away, in the dark night? And where found ye such plenty of tea, that it should be shaken on the floor in heaps, when ye took the shoes from your feet?"

But they held their peace, and spake never a word, so that the wives marvelled. When the morning was fully come, they called together all their households, and spake unto them with authority, saying: "Ye shall taste no tea, not one of you; neither shall it pass through your lips, for it is accursed."

So in all that goodly town, the herb of China, with