_TEA LEAVES_
BY JOHN ERNEST MCCANN
According to Henry Thomas Buckle, the author of "The History of Civilization in England," who was the master of eighteen languages, and had a library of 22,000 volumes, with an income of $75,000 a year, at the age of twenty-nine, in 1850 (he died in 1860, at the age of thirty-nine), tea making and drinking were, or are, what Wendell Phillips would call lost arts. He thought that, when it came to brewing tea, the Chinese philosophers were not living in his vicinity. He distinctly wrote that, until he showed her how, no woman of his acquaintance could make a decent cup of tea. He insisted upon a warm cup, and even spoon, and saucer. Not that Mr. Buckle ever sipped tea from a saucer.
Of course, he was right in insisting upon those above-mentioned things, for tea-things, like a tea-party, should be in sympathy with the tea, not antagonistic to it. Still, not always; for, on one memorable occasion, in the little town of Boston, the greatest tea-party in history was anything but sympathetic. But let that pa.s.s.
Emperor Kien Lung wrote, 200 years or more ago, for the benefit of his children, just before he left the Flowery Kingdom for a flowerier:
"Set a tea-pot over a slow fire; fill it with cold water; boil it long enough to turn a lobster red; pour it on the quant.i.ty of tea in a porcelain vessel; allow it to remain on the leaves until the vapor evaporates, then sip it slowly, and all your sorrows will follow the vapor."
He says nothing about milk or sugar. But, to me, tea without sugar is poison, as it is with milk. I can drink one cup of tea, or coffee, with sugar, but without milk, and feel no ill effects; but if I put milk in either tea or coffee, I am as sick as a defeated candidate for the Presidency. That little bit of fact is written as a hint to many who are ill without knowing why they are, after drinking tea, or coffee, with milk in it. I don"t think that milk was ever intended for coffee or tea. Why should it be? Who was the first to color tea and coffee with milk? It may have been a mad prince, in the presence of his flatterers and imitators, to be odd; or just to see if his flatterers would adopt the act.
The Russians sometimes put champagne in their tea; the Germans, beer; the Irish, whiskey; the New Yorker, ice cream; the English, oysters, or clams, if in season; the true Bostonian, rose leaves; and the Italian and Spaniard, onions and garlic.
You all know one of the following lines, imperfectly. Scarcely one in one hundred quotes them correctly. _I_ never have quoted them as written, off-hand--but lines run out of my head like schoolboys out of school,
"When the lessons and tasks are all ended, And school for the day is dismissed."
Here are the lines:
"Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast; Let fall the curtains; wheel the sofa round; And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn Throws up a steamly column, and the cups That cheer, but not inebriate, wait on each, To let us welcome peaceful evening in."
Isn"t that a picture? Not one superfluous word in it! Who knows its author, or when it was written, or can quote the line before or after
"the cups That cheer, but not inebriate"?
&&or in what poem the lines run down the ages? I tell you? Not I. I don"t believe in encouraging laziness. If I tell you, you will let it slip from your memory, like a panic-stricken eel through the fingers of a panic-stricken schoolboy; but if you hunt it up, it will be riveted to your memory, like a ballet, and one never forgets when, where, how, why, and from whom, he receives that.
What a pity that, in Shakespeare"s time, there was no tea-table!
What a delightful comedy he could, and would, have written around it, placing the scene in his native Stratford! What a charming hostess at a tea-table his mother, Mary Arden (loveliest of womanly names), would have made! Any of the ladies of the delightful "Cranford" wouldn"t be a circ.u.mstance to a tea-table scene in a Warwickshire comedy, with lovely Mary Arden Shakespeare as the protagonist, if the comedy were from the pen of her delightful boy, Will. Had tea been known in Shakespeare"s time, how much more closely he would have brought his s.e.xes, under one roof, instead of sending the more animal of the two off to The Boar"s Head and The Mermaid, leaving the ladies to their own verbal devices.
Shakespeare, being such a delicate, as well as virile, poet, would have taken to tea as naturally as a bee takes to a rose or honeysuckle; for the very word "tea" suggests all that is fragrant, and clean, and spotless: linen, silver, china, toast, b.u.t.ter, a charming room with charming women, charmingly gowned, and peach and plum and apple trees, with the scent of roses, just beyond the open, half-curtained windows, looking down upon, or over, orchard or garden, as the May or June morning breezes suggest eternal youth, as they fill the room with perfume, tenderness, love, optimism, and hope in immortality.
Coffee suggests taverns, cafes, sailing vessels, yachts, boarding-houses-by-the-river-side, and pessimism. Tea suggests optimism. Coffee is a tonic; tea, a comfort. Coffee is prose; tea is poetry. Whoever thinks of taking coffee into a sick-room?
Who doesn"t think of taking in the comforting cup of tea? Can the most vivid imagination picture the angels (above the stars) drinking coffee? No. Yet, if I were to show them to you over the teacups, you would not be surprised or shocked. Would you?
Not a bit of it. You would say:
"That"s a very pretty picture. Pray, what are they talking about, or of whom are they talking?"
Why, of their loved ones below, and of the days of their coming above the stars. They know when to look for us, and while the time may seem long to us before the celestial reunion, to them it is short. They do not worry, as we do. We could not match their beautiful serenity if we tried, for they know the folly of wishing to break or change divine laws.
What delightful scandals have been born at tea-tables--rose and lavender, and old point lace scandals: surely, no brutal scandals or treasons, as in the tavern. Tea-table gossip surely never seriously hurt a reputation. Well, name one. No? Well, think of the shattered reputations that have fallen around the bottle. Men are the worst gossips unhanged, not women.
In 1652, tea sold for as high as 10 in the leaf. Pepys had his first cup of tea in September, 1660. (See his Diary.) The rare recipe for making tea in those days was known only to the elect, and here it is:
"To a pint of tea, add the yolks of two fresh eggs; then beat them up with as much fine sugar as is sufficient to sweeten the tea, and stir well together. The water must remain no longer upon the tea than while you can chant the Miserere psalm in a leisurely fashion."
But I am not indorsing recipes of 250 odd years ago. The above is from the knowledge box of a Chinese priest, or a priest from China, called Pere Couplet (don"t print it Quatrain), in 1667. He gave it to the Earl of Clarendon, and I extend it to you, if you wish to try it.
John Milton knew the delights of tea. He drank coffee during the composition of "Paradise Lost," and tea during the building of "Paradise Regained."
Like all good things, animate and inanimate, tea did not become popular without a struggle. It, like the gradual oak, met with many kinds of opposition, from the timid, the prejudiced, and the selfish. All sorts of herbs were put upon the market to offset its popularity; such as onions, sage, marjoram, the Arctic bramble, the sloe, goat-weed, Mexican goosefoot, speedwell, wild geranium, veronica, wormwood, juniper, saffron, carduus benedictus, trefoil, wood-sorrel, pepper, mace, scurry gra.s.s, plantain, and betony.
Sir Hans Sloane invented herb tea, and Captain Cook"s companion, Dr. Solander, invented another tea, but it was no use--tea had come to stay, and a blessing it has been to the world, when moderately used. You don"t want to become a tea drunkard, like Dr. Johnson, nor a coffee fiend, like Balzac. Be moderate in all things, and you are bound to be happy and live long.
Moderation in eating, drinking, loving, hating, smoking, talking, acting, fighting, sleeping, walking, lending, borrowing, reading newspapers--in expressing opinions--even in bathing and praying--means long life and happiness.
_WIT, WISDOM, AND HUMOR OF TEA_
Tea tempers the spirits and harmonizes the mind, dispels la.s.situde and relieves fatigue, awakens thought and prevents drowsiness, lightens or refreshes the body, and clears the perceptive faculties.--CONFUCIUS.
Thank G.o.d for tea! What would the world do without tea?--how did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.--SYDNEY SMITH.
"Sammy," whispered Mr. Weller, "if some o" these here people don"t want tappin" to-morrow mornin", I ain"t your father, and that"s wot it is. Why this here old lady next me is a drown-in"
herself in tea."
"Be quiet, can"t you?" murmured Sam.
"Sam," whispered Mr. Weller, a moment afterward, in a tone of deep agitation, "mark my words, my boy; if that "ere secretary feller keeps on for five minutes more, he"ll blow himself up with toast and water."
"Well, let him if he likes," replied Sam; "it ain"t no bis"ness of yourn."
"If this here lasts much longer, Sammy," said Mr. Weller, in the same low voice, "I shall feel it my duty as a human bein" to rise and address the cheer. There"s a young "ooman on the next form but two, as has drank nine breakfast cups and a half; and she"s a swellin" wisibly before my wery eyes."--_Pickwick Papers_.
Books upon books have been published in relation to the evil effects of tea-drinking, but, for all that, no statistics are at hand to show that their arguments have made teetotalers of tea-drinkers. One of the best things, however, said against tea-drinking is distinctly in its favor to a certain extent. It is from one Dr. Paulli, who laments that "tea so dries the bodies of the Chinese that they can hardly spit." This will find few sympathizers among us. We suggest the quotation to some enterprising tea-dealer to be used in a street-car advertis.e.m.e.nt.
Of all methods of making tea, that hit upon by Heine"s Italian landlord was perhaps the most economical. Heine lodged in a house at Lucca, the first floor of which was occupied by an English family. The latter complained of the cookery of Italy in general, and their landlord"s in particular. Heine declared the landlord brewed the best tea ho had ever tasted in the country, and to convince his doubtful English friends, invited them to take tea with him and his brother. The invitation was accepted.
Tea-time came, but no tea. When the poet"s patience was exhausted, his brother went to the kitchen to expedite matters. There he found his landlord, who, in blissful ignorance of what company the Heines had invited, cried: "You can get no tea, for the family on the first floor have not taken tea this evening."
The tea that had delighted Heine was made from the used leaves of the English party, who found and made their own tea, and thus afforded the landlord an opportunity of obtaining at once praise and profit by this Italian method of serving a pot of tea.
--_Chambers"s Journal_.
[Ill.u.s.tration of two women]
_FATE_
Matrons who toss the cup, and see The grounds of Fate in grounds of tea.
--_Churchill_.
_TEA MAKING AND TAKING IN j.a.pAN AND CHINA_
The queen of teas in j.a.pan is a fine straw-colored beverage, delicate and subtle in flavor, and as invigorating as a gla.s.s of champagne. It is real j.a.pan tea, and seldom leaves its native heath for the reason that, while it is peculiarly adaptable to the j.a.panese const.i.tution, it is too stimulating for the finely-tuned and over-sensitive Americans, who, by the way, are said to be the largest customers for j.a.pan teas of other grades in the world.
This particular tea, which looks as harmless as our own importations of the leaf, is a very insidious beverage, as an American lady soon found out after taking some of it late at night. She declared, after drinking a small cup before retiring, she did not close her eyes in sleep for a week. We do not know the name of the brand of tea, and are glad of it; for we live in a section where the women are especially curious.