THE CUP THAT CHEERS

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 53, Issue 3828, 2 November 1936, Page 6

THE CUP THAT CHEERS

Dr Johnson mentions tea first coming to London in 1666 when Lord Ossory and Lord Arlington brought their consignment of tea over from Holland to London. But Pepys drank his first cup of tea in 1660 and there are records of sales of tea in 1657 at six guineas a pound, while disputed dates of -earlier importations are 1610 and 1571. In the British Museum can be seen the famous advertisement by Mr Thomas Garways published in Mercuritus Politicus in September 1658 —“The excellent and by all Physitians callfed by the Chineans ‘Tcha,’ by other nations Tay or Tee can be procured at the ‘Sultaness Head CopheeHouse’ in Sweetings Rents by the Royal Exchange ” The history of tea is really v-sry remote and dates back to 2737 B.C. when “Shen-hung, a philosopher, the first teacher of medicine and agriculture, when boiling water for his evening irthal accidentally had some leaves from his faggots (tea-plant) fall into his pot and the flavour so pleased him he gave his knowledge to the world. He said:—“Tea is better than wine for it leadeth not to intoxication, neither does it cause a man to say foolish things and repent thereof in his sober moments,” I have before me now two very fine old Chinese blue porcelain tea chests in which rare tea was sent over to England. They are six-sided and were packed in beautiful finely woven baskets. The subject is Shen-nung tilling the land and carrying his faggots and sitting boiling his pot. Happy B.C. 2737. —Margaret Slierrin.