The Natural History of the Tea-Tree, with Observations on the Medical Qualities of Tea, and on the Effects of Tea-DrinkingLettsom, John Coakley
History
The Natural History of the Tea-Tree, with Observations on the Medical Qualities of Tea, and on the Effects of Tea-Drinking
Lettsom, John Coakley
Tea
“While flows the juice mellifluent from the cane,
Grudge not, my friend, to let thy slaves, each morn,
But chief the sick and young, at setting day,
Themselves regale with oft-repeated draughts
Of tepid nectar, and make labour light[85].”
That there is something in the finer green Teas, that produces
effects peculiar to itself, and not to be equalled by any other
substance we know, is, I believe, admitted by all who have observed,
either what passes in themselves, or the accounts that others give
of their feelings, after a plentiful use of this liquor. Nor are
the finer kinds of bohea Teas incapable of the like influence. They
affect the nerves, produce tremblings, and such a state of body for
the time, as subjects it to be agitated by the most trifling causes,
such as shutting a door too hastily, the sudden entrance even of a
servant, and other the like causes.
I know people of both sexes, who are constantly seized with great
uneasiness, anxiety, and oppression, as often as they take a single
cup of Tea, who nevertheless, for the sake of company, drink several
cups of warm water, mixed with sugar and milk, without the same
inconvenience.
A physician, whose acquaintance I have long been favoured with, and
who, with some others, was present when the preceding experiments
were made at the college of Edinburgh, has a remarkable delicacy in
feeling the effects of a small quantity of fine Tea. If drank in the
forenoon, it affects his stomach with an uneasy sensation, which
continues for several hours, and entirely takes away his appetite
for food at dinner; though at other times, when he takes chocolate
for breakfast, he generally makes a very hearty meal at noon, and
enjoys the most perfect health. If he drink a single dish of tea in
the afternoon, it affects him in the same manner, and deprives him of
sleep for three or four hours through the succeeding night; yet he
can take a cup of warm water with sugar and milk, without the least
inconvenience.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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