Tea Plant

“Tea is the dried leaf of an evergreen shrub of the natural order Ternstœmiaceæ. It includes the China plant, and the indigenous Assam plant. At one time it was supposed that two Chinese species were grown of which one furnished the black tea and the other the green tea of commerce, but further research has shown that these species cannot be maintained. Whether the tea shrub is indigenous in China and Japan is a doubtful question. The fact has been historically established that the culture of tea existed in China in the 4th century, and in Japan in the 9th century, and from these countries it was exclusively obtained for any other part of the globe till the time of the present generation. The discovery of the indigenous plant in the forest country of Upper Assam was made in 1834, and since 1840 its cultivation there has taken very firm root."—(Charles Leonard-Stuart, 1911)

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