But though I have before shewn, from the Authority of _Bauhine_, that the Leaves of one and the same _Chamelæagnus_, sport and vary considerably from each other; yet, I would not, because this may also probably happen to the _Chinese Tea_, have any one infer, that, in _China_, the _Tea_, which some maintain to be the _Cha_ of the _Tartars_, is not adulterated. I am, indeed, of Opinion, that it is adulterated, but never either affirmed, or so much as intended to insinuate, that Nature sported and varied so in the _Chamelæagnus_, either of the _Tartars_, or _Europeans_, as to produce Leaves of a different Species: Nor is this Variation, and Sporting of Nature, surprizing in the _Chamelæagnus_; since it is equally, if not more, palpable, in Prunes of different Colours, Peaches, Apricots, sweet and bitter Almonds, and the Leaves produced by these Trees. I have often carefully viewed and turned over all the three Thousand Plants, with which my Repository is enriched, in order to see whether any of them resembled the spurious _Chinese Tea_, or that with which the genuine is adulterated; and I found the Leaves of two Shrubs highly similar to those of the spurious _Tea_: The one is by _Carolus Clusius_ in _Lib. 5. Rarior. Plantar. Histor. Cap. 20._ called _Pyrola quarta Fruticans_; and _Bauhine_, in his _Pinax_, calls it the _Pyrola Frutescens Arbuti Folio_: The other is a Shrub, called by _Clusius_, in _Lib. 1. Histor. Plant. Cap. 53_, the _Spiræa Theophrasti_, and by _Bauhine_, _Frutex Spicatus Foliis Salignis Serratus dictus_.
Innovation Brief
A Treatise on Tobacco, Tea, Coffee, and Chocolate — Part 22
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