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Irwin - Harrisons & Crosfield, Inc.

NEW YORK - PHILADELPHIA - CHICAGO
BOSTON - SAN FRANCISCO
LONDON: 1-4 GREAT TOWER STREET

COLOMBO CALCUTTA BATAVIA
SHANGHAI HANKOW FOOCHOW
SHIDZUOKA (JAPAN) DAITOTEI (FORMOSA)

MAR 20 1919

Gcas26034

FOREWORD

HE reason that so little is known of the

manufacture of Tea in China is because

foreigners have been discouraged from visit-
ing the producing districts —in fact, actual hostility
has been shown to would-be explorers.

This trip was inspired by the possibility) of per-
suading the Natives to improve their methods, a
difficult task, as all of them are convinced that the
system adopted by their ancestors and hallowed by
antiquity must of necessity be better than any modern
ideas. ‘The result of the visit leaves us astounded
that any quality at all is exhibited in China Tea.
(The crop may be said “just to happen,” as there is
no attempt at cultivation nor is any care taken in its
manufacture, thus proving that the inherent qualities
must be wonderful. There is not a doubt that with
careful cultivation and picking and proper manufac-
ture; China could produce some of the finest Tea in
the World.

IRWIN-HARRISONS & CROSSFIELD, Inc.

Robert L. Hecht,
SECRETARY

COPYRIGHT 1919
BY IRWIN-HARRISONS & CROSSFIELD, Inc.
NEW YORK

NC' Sy’ Zam

A TRIP

©, THE

MEEMUN TEA
Prot RIC E

y realized. For

this, in part, we
were indebted to the
Chinese Government
who provided us with an
escort for the trip and
notified the local authori-
ties of our coming, so that
most of the difficulties
attendant upon foreigners
travelling in the interior

were removed.

BK N the Spring, our long discussed project of a
M\ trip to the Keemun Tea district, to see at first
hand the process of manufacture, Was at length

A MILITARY ESCORT

AT SHANGHAI RAILWAY STATION

On the 18th of March we left Shanghai by train
South to Hangchow which we reached in a few hours;

OUR TWO JUNKS WITH GOVERNMENT FLAGS

for the rest
of our trip
we were
entirely
dependent
on Chinese
means of
locomotion
—by boat

and chair.

Leaving
Hangchow
by boat, we
followed

the course

OUR CHAIRS ARRIVING AT LIKOW

of the Tsien Tang Kiang River up to its source at Yuting,
on the Eastern slopes of the Wooling Shan range. We had
now been travelling for twelve days through picturesque
hilly country. En route, we passed through the well-known
green tea districts of Fychow and Tienkai.

From Yuting, a long day's journey by chair through a
pass in the Wooling Shan, brought us to our objective,

Kimun City, which, spelt as Keemun, is known all over

the world.

Me

HAULING UP A SMALL RAPID

SOLDIERS GUARDING OUR PACKS—TIENKAI

Kimun City, we made our headquarters for three weeks,
staying at the Tea Guild, where rooms were kindly placed
at our disposal. The city is a small one; the buildings and

RESTING AT A TEA HOUSE

City walls are in a
bad state of repair ;
the people generally
are poor, and the
district does not
seem to have fully
recovered from the
ravages of the Tai
Ping rebels of sixty
and more years ago.
The city itself with-
stood a long siege,
though the country
around was laid in
waste.

From Kimun we
made a tour of the
principal districts,
the most noted
being Likow, Chen
Shang, Poncheng,

from w hence comes

h
y
!

| TURTON

a

é

TEA GUILD, KIMUN CITY

the noted “‘Sien Gar” Chop and Kow Tang. We were altogether
eight days on this inspection. What we saw was a sad revela-
tion—tea in China is indigenous, it is a hardy plant and grows

=

FACTORY AT LIKOW

TEA BUSHES AT GODONG

rather than is cultivated. Plantations, in the true sense of the
word, do not exist—in some districts like Poncheng there are
fair sized hills covered with tea, but for the most part the bushes
exist but in small clearings on the hillsides, created by the
farmers in their spare time ; pruning and fertilizing are practicall-y
unknown and many of the bushes are choked with weeds.
Very few
of the factory
owners have
any share or
apparent inter-
est in the tea

grounds. The
method of f-
nancing and
collecting the
tea is as fol-
lows: Early in
the Spring, the
Tea Broker
Hongs_ work-

THE BUYING DEPOT AT KEEMUN VILLAGE

WOMEN PICKING TEA ON HILLS AT KEEMUN

ing from the Market Centre, say Hankow, Changhai or
Foochow according to which district it may belong, send
silver money, partly their own and partly borrowed from native
banks, up to the district factories. These, as soon as the first leaf
is picked, send agents into all the surrounding villages with
money to open the leaf-buying depots.

It is an unfortunate fact that two-thirds of the process of
manufacture are done by the countrymen on the hillsides and
outlying villages, before the tea comes into the hands of the
factories at all. ;

TEA GROWING ON HILLS OF KEEMUN

The owner of the bushes and his family pick the tea them-
selves, or rather strip the bushes of all green leaf. They have
other business to attend to, such as rice cultivation and the
rape seed crop to gather in ; so the speedier they collect the leaf
the better. There is no premium on careful picking, as every-
one’s leaf is mixed up in the factories, where twigs and other
rubbish have to be picked out by a number of children em-
ployed by the factory for that purpose.

The factories during the autumn, winter and early spring are
deserted and closed, and on first arriving in the district, the

SUN DRYING TEA ON RIVER BANK NEAR FOWLING

question of where the necessary labor is to come from puzzles
one. However, afew days before the leaf is ready for picking,
the usual labor migration starts from the south, and all the main
paths over the hills are alive with an endless procession of natives
who sort themselves out among the villages of the district ;
some for work in the factories, others on the hillsides.

The picking of the most forward bushes commences practicall-y
simultaneously ; the more backward bushes are left for a few
days before picking, which explains the second and third packs.

As soon as the sun is up in the morning, and the dew dried
from the leaf, picking begins. When sufficient has been gath-
ered, the leaf is spread out thinly on matting in the sun to wither:
then, when sufficiently soft, so that the thickest stems are no

ROLLING TEA BY HAND

longer brittle, it is placed on the rolling table and manipulated
in large balls by the hands, for a few minutes, until well
bruised and sticky with its own sap.

WITHERING THE GREEN TEA LEAF

The leaf is now ready for fermenting, and is placed in large
circular baskets, covered over with a cloth and placed in the
sun. The process may last for an hour or two hours, accord-
ing to the temperature of the day. The leaf is stirred around
several times, so that the fermentation may be even through-
out. When finished, the leaf will have turned copper-

colored.

The countryman has still one more task to perform, that of
sun drying. The fermented leaf is spread out thin on mats

TEA-DRYING ON MATS—KEEMUN

in the sun and soon assumes a reddish black color, as the

moisture is drawn out of the leaf.

When properly sun-dried, the leaf loses 50% or more of
the original green leaf weight. The countryman now gathers
up his leaf into a bag and makes his way into the nearest
village Where he eVentually sells it to the depot which will pay
the highest price.

YE GREAT TEA MEN OF GODONG

The fac-
tory buyers
have to be
shrewd

men, able to
judge how
much mois-
ture still re-
mainsin the
leaf, as some
country-
men try to
skimp the
sun drying.
However,

this often recoils on them, as they get a poor price, because

over-damp tea may go sour in transit to the factory.

Each day the depot sends its purchases to their factory,
where, after a preliminary firing to preserve it, it is stored until
sufficient leaf has been collected to make one or two hundred

packages of finished tea.

JOSS HOUSE

USED FOR STORAGE

LEAD LININGS FACTORY

‘The final stage has now been reached and it remains for the factory
to produce the finished article. ‘The leaf, as bought by them, isa long,
sprawley article of reddish black color, in style rather resembling

TEA ON ITS WAY TO POYANG LAKE

Pouchong tea.

A light firing
renders the leaf
brittle, and it is
then broken down
to the size, as
known to the trade,
by being passed
through a compli-
cated system of
sieves, of Various
sized mesh, man-
ipulated by hand,
some in lateral mo-
tion, and some in
rotary motion—at
various stages, this
system enables the
workmen to re-
move small stalks
and any coarse leaf

tea.

When the leaf
has all been worked
down to the re-
quired size, it is

ready for the final firings ; of these, there. are usually three, the tea
being placed in baskets over slow charcoal fires. Firing by the Chinese
method is a great art, and though laborious is undoubtedly superior to
the machine firing, as is evident by the superior keeping powers of
China tea. The repeated firings are to insure the expelling of all
moisture from the leaf, slowly, without destroying the flavor and
substance of the tea.

The leaf is then carefully bulked, and after again being lightly
fired, is packed while still warm into the well-known lead-lined China

half-chests; it is now ready for transporting to the market in

Hankow.
From the Kimun side of the Wooling Shang range, a number of

small rivers flow westward into the Poyang lake, which in turn con-
nects with the Yangtsze River. This is the route by which the
Keemun teas reach Hankow, and which we followed. The first part
of the journey from Keemun to Jowchow, at the entrance to the
Poyang lake, is done in very small boats propelled by oars, as the
river is very shallow— only a few packages of tea can be carried in
each. When, however, the Lake is reached, the small boats transfer
their cargoes to big junks which have a capacity of several thousand

*

SCENE AT JOWCHOW—ENTRANCE TO POYANG LAKE

packages each. These are towed by launch through the Lake to
Kiukiang, the first river port on the Yangtsze, where they in turn
discharge into the big river steamers which deliver the cargo in
Hankow in eighteen hours.

From Kimun to Hankow takes approximately eight days—we
reached Hankow on the eighteenth of May, having been in the

interior nearly ten weeks.

From the foregoing description, it will be seen how dependent the
manufacture of tea in China is upon the weather conditions. More-
over, as the finest Keemuns are all made in about a fortnight, it is
very much a case of putting all one’s eggs in one basket.

This explains, doubtless, the big variations from year to year in
teas from the same district.

S. W. HARRIS
of Harrisons, King & Irwin, Ltd.

INSPECTING A TEMPLE—KEEMUN

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