Father de Rhodes, a Jesuit missionary, who entered China in 1633, states that “the use of Tea is common throughout the East, _and begins, I perceive, to be known in Europe_. It is in all the world to be found only in two provinces of China, where the gathering of it occupies the people as the vintage does us.” Adding that he found it in his own case to be an instantaneous remedy for headache, and when compelled to sit up all night to hear confessions its use saved him from drowsiness and fatigue. Adam Olearius, describing the travels of an embassy to Persia in 1631, says of the Persians: “They are great frequenters of taverns, called Tzai Chattai, where they drink Thea or Cha, which the Tartars bring from China, and to which they assign extravagant qualities, imagining that it alone will keep a man in perfect health, and are sure to treat all who visit them to this drink at all hours.” These strong expressions as to the use of Tea, applying as they do to a period not later than 1640, are sufficient to prove that the ordinary accounts place the introduction of that beverage as regards Europe, particularly the Continent, as too late. INTRODUCTION INTO EUROPE. The earliest European notice of Tea is that found in a work by Ramusio, first printed in 1550, though written several years prior to that year. In it he quotes Hazzi Mohamed in effect, “And these people of Cathay (China) do say that if these in our parts of the world only knew of Tea, there is no doubt that our merchants would cease altogether to use _Ravino Cini_, as they call rhubarb.” Yet no accounts at present accessible establish the date of its first introduction into Europe, and it is also a difficult matter to determine to which of the two nations—Portugal or Holland—the credit of first introducing it belongs. Some writers claiming that the Dutch East India Company brought Tea to Amsterdam in 1600, while the Portuguese claim the honor of its first introduction prior to that year. An indisputable argument in favor of the latter is the notice given of it by Giovani Maffei in his “History of India,” published in 1559. “The inhabitants of China, like those of Japan,” he writes, “extract from an herb called _Chia_ a beverage which they drink warm, and which is extremely wholesome, being a remedy against phlegm, languor and a promoter of longevity.” While Giovani Botero, another Portuguese, in a work published in the same year, states that “the Chinese have an herb from which they press a delicate juice, which they use instead of wine, finding it to be a preservative against these diseases which are produced by the use of wine amongst us.” Taxiera, also a native of Portugal, states that he saw the dried leaves of Tea at Malacca some years prior to 1600, and the article is also mentioned in one of the earliest privileges accorded to the Portuguese for trading in 1558; yet it was not until nearly a century from the