A Tea Reader Read Online Free Page B

length, alone in my Tent;
    Restor’d to the Power of enjoying myself, at Liberty. In one Hand, I take the Fruit of the Fo-tchow ,
    Just by Way of Relish;
    In the other, I hold the Cup,
    From the Contents of which, the vaporous Mist sent up,
    Invitingly hovers on the Surface;
    As I sip the Tea,
    I now and then cast a delighted Eye,
    On the Flower Mey-hoa .
    Then it is that I give a Loose to my Thoughts;
    They naturally, of themselves, and without Effort,
    Turn to the Sages of Antiquity. 8 I love to represent to myself the famous Oot-fu-eng
    Whose sole Food was the Fruit of the Pine Song-tchow ,
    In the midst of this primitive Frugality He enjoy’d himself in Peace;
    In Emulation of him,
    I put some Kernels in my Mouth,
    And find them delicious. With Imagination’s Eye,
    Then next I see the virtuous Lin-foo ,
    Pruning and trimming up the Leaves,
    Of the flower Mey-hoa ;
    Thus it was, say I to myself, that that great Man,
    Indulg’d his Mind with some Relaxation;
    A Mind fatigu’d with intense Meditation,
    On the most important Objects;
    I apply myself then to the Flower Mey-hoa ,
    And fancy myself, with Lin-foo , arranging the Leaves,
    And giving to the Plant the most pleasing Form. From Lin-foo I, mentally, make Transition
    To Ttchao-tcheoo , and Yu-tchuang ,
    I think I see the first having before him,
    Various Cups with various teas,
    Affectedly sipping and tasting of each:
    The other I figure to myself drinking churlishly,
    The most exquisitely fine Tea,
    Without any Distinction of its Flavor,
    From that of the coarsest Sort
    Be neither of these Extremes mine. But, hark!—I hear the Martial Music
    Already announce the Evening.
    The reviving Freshness of the Night is coming on
    Already the Moonshine entering at the Windows of my Tent
    Throws a pleasing Light,
    On the Military Simplicity of its Furniture.
    I feel myself free from Fatigue, free from Uneasiness,
    My stomach relieve’d and unoppress’d;
    With my Spirits clear, I may then
    Deliver myself up to sweet Repose.
    In this Mood it was, that, with but a small Talent for Poetry
    I wrote these Lines, in the First of the Spring
    Of the tenth Month of the Ping-yu Year of my Reign.
Footnotes
    1 [Certain British spellings have been amended. Ed.]
    2 May refer to plum blossoms ( Mei Hua ) . It is the national flower of the Taiwan. Translated elsewhere as Mei-hoa and M-i-hoa .
    3 Possible reference to Fo Shou tea, aka Buddha’s Hand, a Wuyi oolong tea. Also translated as Fo-choea , Fo-ch ou , and Fo-cheou .
    4 “Fruit of the pine” are, perhaps, pine nuts.
    5 Hot enough to cook a fish, turning its meat to white.
    6 Other translations say “reddening the crustaceous kind.” Hot enough to cook a lobster, turning its shell from black to red.
    7 Yué in other translations. Refers to the Yue Kiln of Zhejiang Province, one of the most important sites for the creation of celadon porcelain in China.
    8 In the next parts of the ode, Kien-Long imagines how various Chinese “Sages of Antiquity,” philosophers of the past, would experience his current setting. He discusses Oot-fu-eng (also written as Ou-tfuen ) , Lin-foo (also Lin-fou ) , Ttchao-Tcheoo (also Tchaotcheon ) , and Yu-tchuang (also Yu-tchou or Yu-tchouan ) .

Tea to Last Lifetimes
    BY A ARON F ISHER
“It is obvious that the life of action will be shallow indeed if it does not go hand in hand with an interior spiritual life wherefrom the strength and vision needed for action are drawn.”
    â€” Alan Watts
    One of the most amazing experiences of my life happened when my whole family, including my very aged grandfather and great uncle, came to visit me in Taiwan. I took the whole group to see a tea master. The eight of them sat around the table chit-chatting about how exotic the tea room was, with its walls and walls of tea, waterfalls, and bonsai trees. Eventually, my teacher passed me a sly grin and reached behind him to a jar of very old pu-erh tea. Brewing the