English: John Thomson: THE native tea-firing establishments of Canton adjoin the river, or the banks of a creek, and a granite or wooden wharf is one of their most indispensable accessories. A number of men may be seen during the tea season in the front of the house, employed, as shown in the photograph, in picking, sampling, and sorting the tea, or in preparing the chests for its reception. Just within the entrance are one or two offices, where the partners, treasurer, and book-keeper pursue their various avocations ; while, out of doors, are a number of forms and chairs, and a small table be
English: John Thomson: THE native tea-firing establishments of Canton adjoin the river, or the banks of a creek, and a granite or wooden wharf is one of their most indispensable accessories. A number of men may be seen during the tea season in the front of the house, employed, as shown in the photograph, in picking, sampling, and sorting the tea, or in preparing the chests for its reception. Just within the entrance are one or two offices, where the partners, treasurer, and book-keeper pursue their various avocations ; while, out of doors, are a number of forms and chairs, and a small table bespread with hot tea and cups, set in readiness for the accommodation of visitors. Beyond is a large apartment for storing the tea ; it is here also it is weighed and prepared for exportation. After this we enter an open court, and pass into a firing, picking, sorting, and packing department. Above this chamber there is usually a loft where women and children are engaged in removing the stalks and refuse from the bamboo trays on which the tea is spread out. These trays are ranged in rows on long narrow tables, round which a closely packed throng of pickers and sorters ply unceasingly their busy occupation. This room presents the most animated scene in the house. Many of the women are pretty or attractive-looking, and move their small well-formed hands with a marvellous celerity, pouncing upon and tossing aside the smallest fragments of foreign matter which may chance to have become admixed with the tea, and which none but a thoroughly trained eye could ever have discovered at all. It is impossible to visit an establishment of this kind and not be impressed with the orderly habits and business-like atmosphere of the place, where a thoroughly organized system of divided labour has produced from the leaf of a single shrub so many varieties of one of the most delicate and salutary of the luxuries we possess. 11 A TEA HOUSE, CANTON
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Photo credit: © History and Art Collection / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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