Part 43

When we cast our eyes on the absurd names which many Italian academies adopted to characterize the nature of their studies, we find an ample illustration of this science in the Seraphici, the Oscuri, the Immaturi, the Infecundi, the Offuscati, the Somnolenti, and Phantastici!

The most ridiculous and disgusting epithets have been considered honourable distinctions. Thus, when the science of Uroscopia and Uromancy prevailed, we find a Dr. Theodorus Charles, a Wirtemberg physician, calling another learned practitioner, "Urinosa Claritas."

ON THE USE OF TEA.

Such is the growing consumption of this now indispensable article in England, that in 1789 there were imported 14,534,601 lbs., and in 1833 the quantity was increased to 31,829,620 lbs.; the latter importation yielding a revenue of 3,444,101l. In other countries we find the consumption much less. Russia in 1832 imported 6,461,064 lbs.; Holland consumes about 2,800,000 lbs., and France only 230,000 lbs.

It is supposed that tea was first introduced into Europe by the Dutch, about the middle of the seventeenth century; and Lords Arlington and Ossory are said to be the first persons who made it known in England. In 1641, Tulpius, a Dutch physician, mentioned it in his works. In 1667, Fouquet, a French physician, recommended it to the French faculty; and in 1678, an elaborate treatise was written on it by Cornelius Boutkoe, physician to the Elector of Brandenburg. About the same time, several travellers and missionaries, amongst whom we find Koempfer, Kalm, Osbeck, Duhalde, and Lecomte, give various accounts of the plant and its divers qualities.

The Chinese name of this plant is theh, a Fokien word. In the Mandarin it is tcha, and the Japanese call it tsjaa. Loureiro, in his Flora Cochin-China, describes three species of tea. It is a polyandrous plant of the natural order Columniferae, growing to a height varying from three to six feet, and bearing a great resemblance to our myrtle. The blossom is white, with yellow style and anthers, not unlike that of the dog-rose; the leaves are the only valuable part of the plant. The camellias, particularly the camellia sesanqua, of the same natural family, are the only plants liable to be confounded with it. The leaves of the latter camellia are indeed frequently used as a substitute for those of the tea-plant in several districts of China. This shrub is a hardy evergreen, growing in the open air from the equator to the forty-fifth degree of northern latitude; but the climate that appears the most congenial to it seems to be between the twenty-fifth and thirty-third degree. Almost every province and district in China produces tea for local consumption: but what is cultivated for trade is chiefly in Fokien, Canton, Kiang-nan, Kiang-si, and Che-Kiang; Fokien being celebrated for its black tea, and Kiang-nan for the green. The plant is also cultivated in Japan, Tonquin, and Cochin-China, and in some parts of the mountainous tracts of Ava, where, in addition to its use in infusion, it is converted into a pickle preserved in oil. When tea was first introduced as a luxury on particular occasions in the wild districts of Ireland, the people used to throw away the water in which it had been boiled, and eat the leaves with salt-butter or bacon like greens. The Dutch are now endeavouring to propagate this valuable plant in Java, and for that purpose employ cultivators, who have emigrated from Fokien. The Brazilians are making similar attempts, and some tolerable tea has been reared near Rio Janeiro.

The black teas usually imported from Canton are the bohea, congou, souchong, and pekoe, according to our orthography: the French missionaries spelt them as follows: boui, camphou or campoui, saotchaon, and pekao or peko. Our green teas are the twankay, hyson-skin, and hyson, imperial, and gunpowder; the first of which French travellers write tonkay, hayswin-skine, and hayswin. The French import a tea called tehulan, but it is artificially flavoured with a leaf called lan hoa, or the olea fragrans of Linnaeus.

The tea-plant grows to perfection in two or three years: the leaves are carefully picked by the family of the growers, and immediately carried to market, where they are purchased for drying in sheds. The tea-merchants from Canton repair to the several districts where it is produced, and, after purchasing the leaves thus simply desiccated, submit them to various manipulations; after which they are packed in branded cases and parcels called chops, from a Chinese word meaning a seal. Some of the leaf-buds of the finest black tea plants are picked early in the spring, before they expand: these constitute pekoe, sometimes called "white-blossomed tea," from their being intermixed with the blossoms of the olea fragrans. The younger the leaf, the more high-flavoured and valuable is the tea. Green teas are grown and gathered in the same manner; but amongst these the gunpowder stands in the grade of the pekoe among the black, being prepared with the unopened buds of the spring crops. The alleged preparation of green teas upon copper plates, to give them a verdant colour, is an idle story. They are dried in iron vases over a gentle fire; and the operator conducts this delicate work with his naked hand, and the utmost care not to break the fragile leaves. This part of the manipulation is considered the most difficult, as the leaves are rolled into their usual shape between the palms of the hands until they are cold, to prevent them from unrolling. Teas are adulterated by various odoriferous plants, more especially the vitex pinnata, the chloranthus inconspicuus, and the illicium anisatum. In our markets the chief adulteration is operated by the mixture of sloe and ash leaves, and colouring with terra Japonica and other drugs.

That tea is a substance injurious to health is beyond a doubt. Nothing but long habit from early life renders it less baneful than it otherwise would be: persons who take its infusion for the first time invariably experience uncomfortable sensations. It is well known that individuals who are not in the practice of taking tea in the evening, never transgress this habit with impunity; and it is quite clear that a preparation which deprives them of sleep, and renders them restless during a whole night, cannot be salubrious by day; and although the following opinion of Dr. Trotter regarding the use of this leaf is somewhat exaggerated, it is founded on experience; and I have known several persons afflicted with a variety of serious affections who never could obtain relief until they had ceased to consume it.

"Tea is a beverage well suited to the taste of an indolent and voluptuous age. To the glutton it affords a grateful diluent after a voracious dinner; and, from being drunk warm, it gives a soothing stimulus to the stomach of the drunkard: but, however agreeable may be its immediate flavour, the ultimate effects are debility and nervous diseases. There may be conditions of health, indeed, where tea can do no harm, such as in the strong and athletic; but it is particularly hurtful to the female constitution, to all persons who possess the hereditary predisposition to dyspepsia, and all diseases with which it is associated, to gout, and to those who are naturally weak-nerved. Fine tea, where the narcotic quality seems to be concentrated, when taken in a strong infusion, by persons not accustomed to it, excites nausea and vomiting, tremors, cold sweats, vertigo, dimness of sight, and confusion of thought. I have known a number of men and women subject to nervous complaints, who could not use tea in any form without feeling a sudden increase of all their unpleasant symptoms; particularly acidity of the stomach, vertigo, and dimness of the eyes. As the use of this article of diet extends among the lower orders of the community and the labouring poor, it must do the more harm. A man or a woman who has to go through much toil and hardship has need of substantial nourishment; but that is not to be obtained from an infusion of tea. And if the humble returns of their industry are expended in this leaf, what remains for the purchase of food better adapted to labour? In this case tea becomes hurtful, not only from its narcotic quality, but because that quality acts with double force in a body weakened from other causes. This certainly is one great reason for the increased and increasing proportion of nervous, bilious, spasmodic, and stomach complaints, &c. appearing among the lower ranks of life."

It is well known that tea is frequently resorted to by literary men to keep them awake during their lucubrations. Dr. Cullen said he never could take it without feeling gouty symptoms; and we frequently see aged females, who are in the habit of taking strong green tea, subject to paralytic affections. Many experienced physicians, such as Grimm, Crugerus, Wytt, Murray, Letsom, condemn the abuse of the plant as highly dangerous. That it is a most powerful astringent we well know; and the hands of the Chinese who are employed in its preparation are shrivelled, and, to all appearance, burned with caustic. Chemists have extracted from it an astringent liquor containing tannin and gallic acid. This liquor, injected in the veins or under the integuments of frogs, produces palsy of the posterior extremities, and, applied to the sciatic nerve for half an hour, has occasioned death.

There is no doubt that tea acts differently on various individuals. In some it is highly stimulant and exhilarating; in others its effects are oppression and lowness of spirits; and I have known a person who could never indulge in this beverage without experiencing a disposition to commit suicide, and nothing could arouse him from this state of morbid excitement but the pleasure of destroying something, books, papers, or any thing within his reach. Under no other circumstances than this influence of tea were these fearful aberrations observed. It has been remarked that all tea-drinking nations are essentially of a leucophlegmatic temperament, predisposed to scrofulous and nervous diseases. The Chinese, even the degraded Tartar races amongst them, are weak and infirm, their women subject to various diseases arising from debility. Although their confined mode of living, and want of the means of enjoying pure air and exercise, materially tends to render them liable to these affections; still their immoderate use of strong green tea, taken, it is true, in very small quantities at the time, but repeatedly, greatly adds to this predisposition.

From long experience I am convinced that, although tea may in general be considered a refreshing and harmless beverage, yet in some peculiar cases it is decidedly injurious; and many diseases that have baffled all medical exertions, have yielded to the same curative means so soon as the action of tea had been suspended.

MANDRAGORE.

Self-styled wandering Turks and Armenians are frequently met with in crowded cities vending rhubarb, tooth-powder, and various drugs and nostrums, exciting the curiosity of the idlers that group around them, by exhibiting a root bearing a strong resemblance to the human form. This is the far-famed mandragore, of which such wonderful accounts have been related by both ancients and moderns.

This plant is the Atropa Mandragora of Linnaeus, and grows wild in the mountainous and shaded parts of Italy, Spain, and the Levant, where it is also cultivated in gardens. The root bears such a likeness, at least in fancy's eyes, to our species, that it was called Semi-homo. Hence says Columella,

Quamvis semihominis vesano gramine foeta Mandragora pariat flores moestamque cicutam.

The word vesano clearly refers to the supposed power it possessed of exciting delirium. It was also named Circaea, from its having been one of the mystic ingredients employed in Circe's spells; although the wonderful mandragore was ineffectual against the more powerful herb the Moly, which Ulysses received from Mercury. This human resemblance of the root, which is, moreover, of a blackish hue and hairy, inspired the vulgar with the idea that it was nothing less than a familiar daemon. It was gathered with curious rites: three times a magic circle was drawn round it with a naked sword; and the person who was daring enough to pluck it from the earth, was subject to manifold dangers and diseases, unless under some special protection; therefore it was not unusual to get it eradicated by a dog, fastened to it by a cord, and who was whipped off until the precious root was pulled out. According to Josephus, the plant called Buaras, which was gifted with the faculty of keeping off evil spirits, was obtained by a similar canine operation. Often, it was asserted, did the mandragore utter piteous cries and groans, when thus severed from mother earth. Albertus the Great affirms that the root has a more powerful action when growing under a gibbet, and is brought to greater perfection by the nourishing secretions that drop from the criminal's dangling corpse.

Amongst its many wonderful properties, it was said to double the amount of money that was locked up with it in a box. It was also all-powerful in detecting hidden treasures. Most probably the mandragore had bad qualities to underrate its good ones. Amongst these, we must certainly class the blackest ingratitude, since it never seemed to benefit the eloquent advocates of its virtues, who, in general, were as poor as their boasted plant was rich in attraction.

It was also supposed to possess the delightful faculty of increasing population and exciting love; and the Emperor Julian writes to Calixines that he is drinking the juice of mandragore to render him amorous. Hence was it called Loveapple; and Venus bore the name of Mandragontis. It has been asserted by various scholiasts, that the mandrake which Reuben found in the fields and carried to his mother, Leah, was the mandragore; the Dudaim, however, which he gathered was not, according to all accounts, an unpleasant fruit, but is supposed to have been a species of orchis, still used in the East in love-philters and prolific potions. The word Dudaim seems to express a tuberculated plant; and in Solomon's Songs, he thus describes it: "The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of pleasant fruits, new and old, which I have laid up for thee, O my beloved." Now it is utterly impossible, whatever may have been the revolution in taste since the days of Solomon, that the nauseous and offensive mandragore could have been considered as a propitiating present to a lady.

The etymology of the word Dudaim would seem to describe it. It is derived from the word [Hebrew], (Dadim) breasts, or [Hebrew], (Dodim) friends, neighbours, twins; which indicates that this plant is formed of two similar parts. It is thought that the Dudaim might be the highly-scented melon which is cultivated in the East, especially in Persia, and known by the name of Destenbuje, or the Cucumis Dudaim of Linnaeus, and which is also found in Italy, where its powerful aroma is imparted to garments and chambers. It must have been an odoriferous production, since in the Talmud we find it denominated Siglin, which has been considered the jessamine or the lily. The orchis is remarkable for its double bulbous roots and its agreeable perfume; we may therefore justify the idea that the Dudaim of the Jews was a species of this plant.

Frontinus informs us that Hannibal employed mandragore in one of his warlike stratagems, when he feigned a retreat, and left in the possession of the barbarians a quantity of wine in which this plant had been infused. Intoxicated by the potent beverage, they were unable to withstand his second attack, and were easily put to the sword. Was it the mandragore that saved the Scotch in a similar ruse de guerre with the Danish invaders of Sweno? It is supposed to have been the Belladonna, or deadly nightshade, the effects of which are not dissimilar to those of the plant in question.

In the north of Europe, this substance is still used for medicinal purposes; and Boerhaave, Hoffberg, and Swediaur have strongly recommended it in glandular swellings, arthritic pains, and various diseases where a profuse perspiration may be desirable.

Machiavel has made the fabulous powers of the mandragore the subject of a comedy, and Lafontaine has employed it as an agent in one of his tales.

Another root that excited superstitious phantasies and reverential awe, from its supposed resemblance to the human form, was the Gin-seng, a Chinese production, which, according to the author of the Kao-li-tchi-tsan, or Eulogium of the Kingdom of Corea, "imitates the configuration of man and the efficacy of spiritual comfort, possessing hands and feet like a human being, and the mental virtues that no one can easily comprehend." According to Jartoux, Gin-seng signifies "the representation of man." It appears, however, that the learned father was in error. Jin, it is true, signifies man; but Chen does not mean representation, but a ternary body. Hence Gin-seng signifies the ternary of man, making three with man and heaven!--no doubt some superstitious tradition, since this root bears various names in other countries, that plainly denote the veneration in which it was held. In Japan it is called Nindsin, and Orkhoda in the Tatar-Mandchou language, both of which mean "the queen of plants." Father Lafitau informs us that the name of Garent-oguen of the Iroquois, which it also bears, means the thighs of man. The Gin-seng is a native of Tartary, Corea, and also thrives in Canada, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, in shaded and damp situations, as it soon perishes under the solar rays. The Chinese attach considerable value to it. Thunberg informs us that it sometimes is sold for forty pounds a pound; and Osbeck states that in his time it was worth twenty-four times its weight in silver. This enormous price frequently induced foreign smugglers to bring it into the Chinese territory; but the severest laws were enacted to punish this fraudulent traffic. The Tartars alone possess the privilege of cultivating and collecting it; and the districts that produce this precious plant are surrounded with palisades, and strictly guarded. In 1707, the Emperor of China, to increase his revenue, sent a body of ten thousand troops to collect the gin-seng. According to the Chinese physicians, this root possesses the faculty of renovating exhausted constitutions, giving fresh vigour, raising the drooping moral and physical faculties, and restoring to health and embonpoint the victim of debauchery. It is also said that a bit of the root chewed by a man running a race will prevent his competitor from getting the start of him. It is somewhat singular that the same property is attributed to garlic; and the Hungarian jockeys frequently tie a clove of it to their racers' bits, when the horses that run against them fall back the moment they breathe the offensive odour. It has been proved that no horse will eat in a manger if the mouth of any other steed in the stable has been rubbed with the juice of this plant. I had occasion to ascertain this fact. A horse of mine was in the same stall with one belonging to a brother officer; mine fell away and refused his food, while his companion throve uncommonly well. I at last discovered that a German groom, who had charge of the prosperous animal, had recourse to this vile stratagem. It is also supposed that men who eat garlic knock up upon a march the soldiers who have not made use of it. Hence, in the old regulations of the French armies, there existed an order to prohibit the use of garlic when troops were on a march.

BARBER-SURGEONS, AND THE PROGRESS OF CHIRURGICAL ART.

No consideration should render man more thankful to his Creator, and justly proud of the progress of human intellect, than the perfection to which the art of surgery has been carried. In its present improved condition, we are struck with horror at the perusal of the ancient practice, and marvel that its barbarity did not sooner induce its professors to diminish the sum of misery it inflicted on their victims. Ignorance, and its offspring Superstition, seemed to sanctify this darkness. Improvement was considered as impious and unnecessary; and to deny the powers of the chirurgical art, heresy against the holy men, who alone were permitted to exercise it.

This supposed divine attribute of the priesthood can be traced to remote ages: Aesculapius was son of Apollo, and princes and heroes did not consider the art of surgery beneath their dignity. Homer has illustrated the skill of Podalirius and Chiron; and Idomeneus bids Nestor to mount his chariot with Machaon, who alone was more precious than a thousand warriors; while we find Podalirius, wrecked and forlorn on the Carian coast, leading to the altar the daughter of the monarch whom he cured, and whose subjects raised a temple to his memory, and paid him divine honours.