Tea service

“ One of the newest suggestions for an original hospitality is "A Grandmother's Tea Party." If you have an "at home" day, as every busy woman should, and you want to serve tea to your guests, offer it to them as it was offered fifty years or more ago.
First of all, collect all of your antique table service. Every family has some dear old treasures of the kind—tea cups, old linen, flower vases, silver epergns, etc. ”

“ We play the part... but say, old chap, oh, isn’t it a bore?
We work like slaves, we eat too much, we put on evening dress;
We’ve everything a man can want, I think... but happiness.
Come, let us sneak away, old chum; forget that we are rich,
And earn an honest appetite, and scratch an honest itch.
Let’s be two jolly garreteers, up seven flights of stairs,
And wear old clothes and just pretend we aren’t millionaires;
And wonder how we’ll pay the rent, and scribble ream on ream,
And sup on sausages and tea, and laugh and loaf and dream. ”

“ Once on a time no confectioner, railway-station, or refreshment-house could rival the home-made brew, made under the eye of the mistress of the household, with the kettle on the hob and the ingredients at hand; but now that the good old custom of tea-making is considered unladylike, and the manufacture has been handed over to the servants, the great charm of the beverage has virtually departed. No one can conscientiously say that they like English tea as at present administered, for the very good reason that it is no longer prepared scientifically. ”

“ Though the beverage was served in public pleasure gardens as well as coffee houses during the early 1700’s in England, social tea drinking in the home was gradually coming into favor. The coffee houses continued as centers of political, social, and literary influence as well as of commercial life into the first half of the 19th century, for apparently Englishmen preferred to drink their coffee in public rather than private houses and among male rather than mixed company. ”

“ The tea set, undoubtedly of porcelain, includes cups and saucers, a cream or milk container, and a sugar container with tongs. (Photo courtesy of Colonial Williamsburg, Inc.)
At first the scarcity and expense of the tea, the costly paraphernalia used to serve it, and the leisure considered necessary to consume it, limited the use of this commodity to the upper classes. For these reasons, social tea drinking was, understandably, a prestige custom. ”

“ This superior article is entirely unknown in the consuming countries, and is one of the luxuries in store for us when tea-culture becomes one of our industries. Thus, seeing that much of the care bestowed upon the manufacture of tea is merely for the purpose of meeting these commercial exactions, both in regard to protecting its flavor as well as to its appearance on arrival, it may be that by ignoring mere appearance and style, as equally good a beverage may be produced by an entirely different system of preparation of the leaf for the home market. ”

“ To one side near the fireplace a man and two women drinking tea are seated at an ornately carved, square tea table with a matching stand for the hot water kettle. On a dish or circular stand in the center of the table is a squat teapot with matching cups and saucers arranged in parallel rows on either side.
Tea-drinking guests seem to have been free to sit or stand according to their own pleasure or the number of chairs available, and Barbé-Marbois noted that at American tea parties “people change seats, some go, others come.” ”

“ From the mountains the road drops to a rich tea country, where every hill-side is green with the thick-set little bushes. At harvest-time cart-loads of basket-fired, or country-dried, tea fill the road to the ports, to be toasted finally in iron pans, and coated with indigo and gypsum to satisfy the taste of American tea-drinkers. In every town farmers may be seen dickering with the merchants over the tough paper sacks of tea that they bring in, and within the houses groups sitting at low tables sort the leaves into grades with swift fingers. ”

“ While on the other hand, if the dealer makes a small but necessary sacrifice for the sake of future gain and reputation by selling only Tea that is Tea, and content himself with a fair but legitimate profit, satisfaction will be given to his customers, his Tea trade fostered and extended, and the consumption of this most important food auxiliary increased throughout the country. ”

“ There is no article handled by the grocer which demands greater attention, engages more of his time, or has a more important bearing upon the success of his business than Tea, as it stands in many respects far ahead of all the other commodities in commanding and maintaining patronage, as well as in attracting and retaining trade for numerous other articles, and at the same time yielding a larger margin of profit to the dealer. ”

“ A grocer cannot manufacture spices or sugar, grow wine, distil whisky or brew beer, but he can, as generations of grocers have done before him, sell good tea out of an honest tea-chest,—or caddy—and make a respectable living, if not money, out of it for himself and not for others, while serving the public well at the same time. ”

“ One needs not the expensive craft of the cha-sze to know how neatly a little skilful manipulation, and a little heat applied secundum artem, can transform these willow leaves into genuine and delicate85 tea leaves. Whether the mercantile result be intended to astonish the palates of old ladies in London or Glasgow, or to pass as genuine Souchong with skippers, who have little knowledge of Tea, we know not; but the fact remains, that the trade thrives well and pays. ”

“ Extract of a Letter from a merchant in New York, to Wm. Kelly, of London, dated 5th Novr, 1773:
"The introduction of the East India Company's tea is violently opposed here, by a set of men who shamefully live by monopolizing tea in the smuggling way." ”

“ Tea, coffee, and chocolate are so general as to be found in the most remote cabins, if not for daily use, yet for visitors, mixed with Muscovado, or raw sugar.
America was becoming a country of tea drinkers. Then, in 1767, the Townshend Act imposed a duty on tea, among other imported commodities. Merchants and citizens in opposition to the act urged a boycott of the taxed articles. ”

“ In these warehouses the tea is assorted, repacked, and then put on board the chop-boats and sent down the river to the ships at their anchorage off Whampoa. Here are enormous scales for weighing the chests; here, where the light falls in from the roof, are tables placed for superintendents, who carefully watch the workmen; farther off, are foreigners inspecting a newly arrived chop; at the extreme end is the little apartment where the tea merchant receives people upon business ”

“ The public generally are ignorant in such matters, and the legitimate dealer might look with amused surprise on the apparent demand for packet teas if it were not that an increasing number of dealers are adopting the new system. Engaged as most of the grocers are in trying to stop the plague of all sorts of proprietary goods which yield them so little profit and make them the servants only of the manufacturers and proprietors, it is astonishing, to say the least, that other dealers should be found who are adopting the same system with tea. ”

“ For I’ll never be govern’d by tyranny’s laws. Many people gave up tea for the duration of the war and offered various substitute beverages such as coffee and dried raspberry leaves, “a detestable drink” which the Americans “had the heroism to find good,” remarked a postwar visitor, Léon Chotteau. [16] Although the colonists had banished tea “with enthusiasm,” the tea habit was not forgotten. Chotteau further noted that “they all drink tea in America as they drink wine in the South of France.” Tea drinking continued to be an important social custom in the new nation well into the 19th century. ”

“ By following these precautions he becomes noted for keeping a tea that cannot be secured elsewhere and one which, after his customers become once educated to that especial flavor, will not be satisfied with any other.
“The world moves” and the American tea dealer should move with it, as time and experience has proved beyond dispute that skilful and judicious Tea-blending 178will be found to amply repay the study and labor bestowed on it. The chief and only difficulty existing in the art lays in first finding a combination that will please a majority of your customers. ”

“ In the larger cities this is the most successful course to pursue, particularly if the kind and quality of the tea be kept regular and uniform the year round, as it secures the return again and again of the same customers for that particular tea, and thus keeps a business always steady and progressive. ”

“ A fluted edge is a most uncomfortable finish for a drinking vessel. The wafer-basket may be silver, china or cut glass.
For the winter months many hostesses have introduced a variety on the menu of the five o'clock tea table. Tea is a doubtful beverage in many hands, and is wholly abjured by many women as injurious to the complexion, hence a big, egg-shaped urn, beneath which a tiny alcohol jet burns, is set up in the corner of the drawing-room. The urn is filled with chicken bouillon, served piping hot in small silver cups, and with an invigorating dash of sherry for those who prefer it so. ”

“ Every pound bought had to be paid for in a very short time, and this fact, coupled with the fear of a falling market, has continuously forced the pace and driven the tea into the consumer's teapot. The demand from the masses for strong tea was met by the extra strength from the British-grown varieties. This demand exists mainly from English tea drinkers of middle and lower classes, who have always insisted that all their beverages should be pungent, strong and stimulating, whether it be porter, ale, coffee or other liquor, regardless of the effect upon the nervous system. ”

“ He craves a stronger liquor, and believing he can only get it at the publichouse, he returns there. In the same way a poor working woman, exhausted by long hours of toil in a confined workroom or foetid dwelling, finds that the weak washy fluid too often sold under the name of tea will not allay the 'sinking' of which she complains, and she too returns to the dram shop. Yet coffee and tea of excellent quality, strong and fragrant, may be sold to a fair profit at 1d. per cup, holding half-a-pint, and a wholesome, though less nutritious, beverage at 1d. ”

“ Provide a place for ladies to dress their hair, with a glass, pins, and combs. A pitcher of cold water and a tumbler should be added. When the company is small, it is becoming a common method for the table to be set at one end of the room, the lady of the house to pour out tea, and the gentlemen of the party to wait on the ladies and themselves. When tea is sent round, always send a tea-pot of hot water to weaken it, and a slop-bowl, or else many persons will drink their tea much stronger than they wish. ”

“ It is also apparent that 90 per cent. of the world’s supply is chiefly consumed by English-speaking people, fully 75 per cent. of this being used by England and her dependencies alone, the United States being next in importance as a tea-consuming country. And it may here be noted that while the world’s production of tea has been very largely increased during the last quarter of a century in greater ratio than that of any other of the great staples of commerce, the production of China and Japan having increased at least 50 per cent. ”

“ Consumed by all classes, serving not simply as an article of diet, but as a refreshing and invigorating beverage, Tea cannot be too highly estimated. The wisdom of successive financiers, and the enterprise71 of generations of merchants, have combined to deliver Tea in this country at a price which brings it within the reach of every individual, making it, perhaps, the only real luxury which is common to rich and poor alike. ”

“ Oranges were changed into pots of marmalade, and given away to the boys, and a chest of tea was converted into a tray carrying a steaming teapot, sugar, milk, cups of tea, and handed by the attendants to the ladies in the reserved seats only—such is the blighting influence of cash, which caused the one-shilling people to be neglected and the eighteenpenny-reserved-seat folks to have their teas. ”

“ The liquor is of a rich straw color, its value consisting in a combination of piquancy, pungency and delicate aroma.
To successfully accomplish the building up of a profitable and permanent Tea business three things are requisite: (1.) The dealer must keep the best Teas obtainable at the most popular prices. (2.) He must let the public know by advertising or other means that he keeps them. (3.) It is also most important that all standard blends should possess some distinct or characteristic flavor by which it may be readily recognized by those who use it. ”

“ This may be true, but it is delusive, as people seldom complain; they go elsewhere and get better value. Every community becomes accustomed to drinking a particular description of tea and is quick to discover any change in the character and flavor of any tea that may be substituted for it, thereby becoming dissatisfied notwithstanding that even a higher-priced tea, of different character, may be given them. For this reason the dealer will do well to keep as close to the grade and variety in use there and as nearly uniform as possible at all times maintaining a “standard.” ”