Part 3

Concerning tea, the Abbé Robin went so far as to say that "there is not a single person to be found, who does not drink it out of china cups and saucers."[52] However exaggerated the statement may be, it does reflect the popularity and availability of Chinese export porcelain in the post-Revolutionary period when Americans were at last free to engage in direct trade with the Orient. Porcelain for the American market was made in a wide variety of forms, as well as in complete dinner and tea sets, and was often decorated to special order. Handpainted monograms, insignia of various kinds, and patriotic motifs were especially popular. A tea set decorated in this way was sent to Dr. David Townsend of Boston, a member of the Society of the Cincinnati, by a fellow member of the Society, Maj. Samuel Shaw, American consul at Canton. In a letter to Townsend from Canton, China, dated December 20, 1790, Shaw wrote:

Accept, my dear friend, as a mark of my esteem and affection, a tea set of porcelain, ornamented with the Cincinnati and your cypher. I hope shortly after its arrival to be with you, and in company with your amiable partner, see whether a little good tea improves or loses any part of its flavor in passing from one hemisphere to the other.

Appended to the letter was the following inventory,[53] which provides us with a list of the pieces deemed essential for a fashionably set tea table:

2 tea pots & stands Sugar bowl & do Milk ewer Bowl & dish 6 breakfast cups & saucers 12 afternoon do

Porcelain, however, had long been a part of China-trade cargos to Europe and from there to America. The early shipments of tea had included such appropriate vessels for the storage, brewing, and drinking of the herb as tea jars, teapots, and teacups. The latter were small porcelain bowls without handles, a form which the Europeans and Americans adopted and continued to use throughout the 18th century for tea, in contrast to the deeper and somewhat narrower cups, usually with handles, in which chocolate and coffee were served. Even after Europeans learned to manufacture porcelain early in the 18th century, the ware continued to be imported from China in large quantities and was called by English-speaking people, "china" from its country of origin. Porcelain also was referred to as "India china ware," after the English and continental East India Companies, the original traders and importers of the ware. "Burnt china" was another term used in the 18th century to differentiate porcelain from pottery.

Whatever the ware, the teacups and saucers, whether on a tray, the cloth, or a bare table, were usually arranged in an orderly manner about the teapot, generally in rows on a rectangular table or tray and in a circle on a round table or tray. In the English conversation piece painting titled _Mr. and Mrs. Hill in Their Drawing Room_, by Arthur Devis about 1750, the circular tripod tea table between the couple and in front of the fireplace is set in such a way. The handleless teacups on saucers are neatly arranged in a large semicircle around the rotund teapot in the center that is flanked on one side by a bowl and on the other by a jug for milk or cream and a sugar container. Generally, cups and saucers were not piled one upon the other but spread out on the table or tray where they were filled with tea and then passed to each guest.

Pictures show male and female guests holding both cup and saucer or just the cup. An English satirical print, _The Old Maid_ (fig. 14), published in 1777, was the only illustration found that depicted an individual using a dish for tea, or, to be exact, a saucer. In the 18th century a dish of tea was in reality a cup of tea, for the word "dish" meant a cup or vessel used for drinking as well as a utensil to hold food at meals. A play on this word is evident in the following exchange reported by Philip Fithian between himself and Mrs. Carter, the mistress of Nomini Hall, one October forenoon in 1773: "Shall I help you, Mr. Fithian, to a Dish of Coffee?--I choose a deep Plate, if you please Ma'am, & Milk."[54] The above suggests that the practice of saucer sipping, while it may have been common among the general public, was frowned upon by polite society. The fact that Americans preferred and were "accustomed to eat everything hot" further explains why tea generally was drunk from the cup instead of the saucer. According to Peter Kalm, "when the English women [that is, of English descent] drank tea, they never poured it out of the cup into the saucer to cool it, but drank it as hot as it came from the teapot."[55] Later in the century another naturalist, C. F. Volney, also noted that "very hot tea" was "beloved by Americans of English descent."[56] From this it would appear that "dish of tea" was an expression rather than a way of drinking tea in the 18th century. On the table a saucer seems always to have been placed under the cup whether the cup was right side up or upside down.

Teaspoons, when in use, might be placed on the saucer or left in the cups. The portrait titled _Mrs. Calmes_ (fig. 15), painted by G. Frymeier in 1806, indicates that handling a cup with the spoon in it could be accomplished with a certain amount of grace. Teaspoons also were placed in a pile on the table or in a silver "Boat for Tea Spoons," or more often in such ceramic containers as "Delph Ware ... Spoon Trays," or blue-and-white or penciled china "spoon boats."[57]

Tongs were especially suited for lifting the lumps of sugar from their container to the teacup. During the 18th century both arched and scissor type tongs were used. Instead of points, the latter had dainty flat grips for holding a lump of sugar (fig. 16). The early arched tongs were round in section, as are the pair illustrated in _Tea Party in the Time of George I_ (fig. 5), while tongs made by arching or bending double a flat strip of silver (fig. 17) date from the second half of the 18th century. These articles of tea equipage, variously known as "tongs," "tea tongs," "spring tea tongs," and "sugar tongs," were usually made of silver, though "ivory and wooden tea-tongs" were advertised in 1763.[58] According to the prints and paintings of the period, tongs were placed in or near the sugar container. Teaspoons were also used for sugar, as illustrated in the painting _Susanna Truax_ (fig. 2). Perhaps young Miss Truax is about to indulge in a custom favored by the Dutch population of Albany as reported by Peter Kalm in 1749: "They never put sugar into the cup, but take a small bit of it into their mouths while they drink."[59]

Shallow dishes, such as the one seen in the portrait _Susanna Truax_, and hemispherical bowls were used as containers for sugar. Often called "sugar dishes" or just "sugars," they were available in delftware, glass (fig. 18), and silver as well as in blue-and-white, burnt, enameled, and penciled china. Some containers were sold with covers, and it has been suggested that the saucer-shaped cover of the hemispherical sugar dish or bowl, fashionable in the first half of the 18th century, also served as a spoon tray. However, in the painting _Tea Party in the Time of George I_ (fig. 5) the cover is leaning against the bowl and the spoons are in an oval spoon tray or boat. Another possibility, if the lid was multipurpose, is that it was used as a dish or stand under the teapot to protect the table top. Silver sugar boxes, basins, and plated sugar baskets were other forms used to hold sugar,[60] which, in whatever container, was a commodity important to the Americans. As Moreau de St. Méry noted, they "use great quantities in their tea."[61]

Containers for cream or milk may be seen in many of the 18th-century teatime pictures and are found in the advertisements of the period under a variety of names. There were cream pots of glass and pewter and silver (figs. 19 and 20), jugs of penciled and burnt china, and in the 1770's one could obtain "enameled and plain three footed cream jugs" from Mr. Henry William Stiegel's glass factory at Manheim, Pennsylvania. There were cream pails, urns, and ewers of silver plate, and plated cream basins "gilt inside."[62] Milk pots, used on some tea tables instead of cream containers, were available in silver, pewter, ceramic, and "sprig'd, cut and moulded" glass.[63] Although contemporary diarists and observers of American customs seem not to have noticed whether cream was served cold and milk hot, or if tea drinkers were given a choice between cream and milk, the Prince de Broglie's comment already cited concerning his ability to drink "excellent tea with even better cream" and the predominance of cream over milk containers in 18th-century advertisements would seem to indicate that in this country cream rather than milk was served with tea in the afternoon.

While the Americans, as the Europeans, added cream or milk and sugar to their tea, the use of lemon with the beverage is questionable. Nowhere is there any indication that the citrus fruit was served or used with tea in 18th-century America. Punch seems to have been the drink with which lemons were associated.

Often a medium-sized bowl, usually hemispherical in shape, is to be seen on the tea table, and it is most likely a slop bowl or basin. According to advertisements these bowls and basins were available in silver, pewter, and ceramic.[64] Before a teacup was replenished, the remaining tea and dregs were emptied into the slop bowl. Then the cup might be rinsed with hot water and the rinsing water discarded in the bowl. The slop basin may also have been the receptacle for the mote or foreign particles--then inherent in tea but now extracted by mechanical means--that had to be skimmed off the beverage in the cup. In England this was probably done with a small utensil known to present day collectors as a mote spoon or mote skimmer. Although the exact purpose of these spoons remains unsettled, it seems likely that they were used with tea. It has been suggested that the perforated bowl of the spoon was used for skimming foreign particles off the tea in the cup and the tapering spike-end stem to clear the clogged-up strainer of the teapot spout. The almost complete absence of American-made mote spoons suggests that these particular utensils were seldom used here. Possibly the "skimmer" advertised in 1727 with other silver tea pieces was such a spoon.[65] No doubt, tea strainers (fig. 21) were also used to insure clear tea. The tea dregs might then be discarded in the slop bowl or left in the strainer and the strainer rested on the bowl. However, only a few contemporary American advertisements and inventories have been found which mention tea strainers.[66] Punch strainers, though generally larger in size, seem to have doubled as tea strainers in some households. The 1757 inventory of Charles Brockwell of Boston includes a punch strainer which is listed not with the wine glasses and other pieces associated with punch but with the tea items: "1 Small Do. [china] Milk Pot 1 Tea Pot 6 Cups & 3 Saucers & 1 Punch Strainer."[67] Presumably, the strainer had last been used for tea.

The teapot was, of course, the very center of the social custom of drinking tea; so, it usually was found in the center of the tray or table. At first, only teapots of Oriental origin imported with the cargos of tea were available, for the teapot had been unknown to Europeans before the introduction of the beverage. However, as tea gained acceptance as a social drink and the demand for equipage increased, local craftsmen were stimulated to produce wares that could compete with the Chinese imports. Teapots based on Chinese models and often decorated with Chinese motifs were fashioned in ceramic and silver. No doubt many an 18th-century hostess desired a silver teapot to grace her table and add an elegant air to the tea ceremony. A lottery offering one must have raised many a hope, especially if, as an advertisement of 1727 announced, the "highest Prize consists of an Eight Square Tea-Pot," as well as "six Tea-Spoons, Skimmer and Tongs." By the end of the century "an elegant silver tea-pot with an ornamental lid, resembling a Pine-apple" would have been the wish of a fashion-conscious hostess. Less expensive than silver, but just as stylish according to the merchants' advertisements were "newest fashion teapots" of pewter or, in the late 18th century, Britannia metal teapots. The latest mode in ceramic ware also was to be found upon the tea table. In the mid-18th century it was "English brown China Tea-Pots of Sorts, with a rais'd Flower" (probably the ceramic with a deep, rich brown glaze known today as Jackfield-type ware), "black," "green and Tortois" (a pottery glazed with varigated colors in imitation of tortoise shell), and "Enameled Stone" teapots. At the time of the American Revolution, teaware imports included "Egyptian, Etruscan, embossed red China, agate, green, black, colliflower, white, and blue and white stone enamelled, striped, fluted, pierced and plain Queen's ware tea pots."[68]

Sometimes the teapot, whether ceramic, pewter, or silver, was placed upon a dish or small, tile-like stand with feet. These teapot stands served as insulation by protecting the surface of the table or tray from the damaging heat of the teapot. Stands often were included in tea sets but also were sold individually, such as the "Pencil'd China ... tea pot stands," advertised in 1775, and the "teapot stands" of "best London plated ware" imported in 1797.[69] The stands must have been especially useful when silver equipage was set on a bare table top; many of the silver teapots of elliptical shape with a flat base, so popular in the latter part of the 18th century, had matching stands raised on short legs to protect the table from the expanse of hot metal. On occasion the teapot was placed on a spirit lamp or burner to keep the beverage warm.

In most instances it was the hot water kettle that sat upon a spirit lamp or burner rather than a teapot. Kettles were usually related to the form of contemporary teapots, but differed in having a swing handle on top and a large, rather flat base that could be placed over the flame. Advertisements mention teakettles of copper, pewter, brass, and silver, some "with lamps and stands."[70] The actual making of tea was part of the ceremony and was usually done by the hostess at the tea table. This necessitated a ready supply of boiling water close at hand to properly infuse the tea and, as Ferdinand Bayard reported, it also "weakens the tea or serves to clean up the cups."[71] Thus, the kettle and burner on their own individual table or stand were placed within easy reach of the tea table. According to 18th-century pictures the kettle was an important part of the tea setting, but it seldom appeared on the tea table. Special stands for kettles generally were made in the same form as the tea tables, though smaller in scale (fig. 14). The square stands often had a slide on which to place the teapot when the hot water was poured into it.

Both pictures and advertisements reveal that by the 1770's the tea urn was a new form appearing at teatime in place of the hot water kettle. Contrary to its name, the tea urn seldom held tea. These large silver or silver-plated vessels, some of which looked like vases with domed covers, usually had two handles on the shoulders and a spout with a tap in the front near the bottom. "Ponty pool, japanned, crimson, and gold-striped Roman tea urns" imported from Europe were among the fashionable teawares advertised at the end of the 18th century.[72] The urn might be placed on a stand of its own near the table or on the tray or table in the midst of the other equipage as it is in the painting titled _The Honeymoon_ (fig. 9). Wherever placed, it signified the newest mode in teatime furnishings. One Baltimorean, O. H. Williams, in a letter dated April 12, 1786, to a close friend, enthusiastically explained that "Tea & Coffee Urns plated (mine are but partially plated and are extremely neat) are the genteelest things of the sort used now at any House & tables inferior to the first fortunes."[73]

The tea canister (fig. 22), a storage container for the dry tea leaves, was yet another piece of equipment to be found on the table or tray. Ceramic canisters of blue and white, and red and gold, could be purchased to match other tea furnishings of the same ware, and silver tea canisters often were fashioned to harmonize with the silver teapots of the period. Individual canisters were produced, as well as canisters in sets of two or three. A set of canisters usually was kept in the box in which it came, a case known as a tea chest or tea caddy, such as the "elegant assortment of Tea-caddies, with one, two and three canisters" advertised in 1796.[74] Canister tops if dome-shaped were used to measure out the tea and transfer it to the teapot. Otherwise, small, short-handled spoons with broad, shallow bowls known as caddy spoons and caddy ladles were used. However handled, the tea could have been any one of the numerous kinds available in the 18th century. Although Hyson, Soughong, and Congo, the names inscribed on the canister in figure 22, may have been favored, there were many other types of tea, as the following advertisement from the _Boston News-Letter_ of September 16, 1736, indicates:[75]

To be Sold ... at the Three Sugar Loaves, and Cannister ... very choice Teas, viz: Bohea Tea from 22 s. to 28 s. per Pound, Congou Tea, 34 s. Pekoe Tea, 50 s. per Pound, Green Tea from 20 s. to 30 s. per Pound, fine Imperial Tea from 40 s. to 60 s. per Pound.

In the 18th century tea drinking was an established social custom with a recognized etiquette and distinctive equipage as we know from the pictures and writings of the period. At teatime men and women gathered to pursue leisurely conversations and enjoy the sociability of the home.

A study of _An English Family at Tea_ (frontispiece) will summarize the etiquette and equipage of the ritual--

On the floor near the table is a caddy with the top open, showing one canister of a pair. The mistress of the house, seated at the tea table, is measuring out dry tea leaves from the other canister into its lid. Members of the family stand or sit about the square tea table while they observe this first step in the ceremony. A maidservant stands ready with the hot water kettle to pour the boiling water over the leaves once they are in the teapot. In the background is the tripod kettle stand with a lamp, where the kettle will be placed until needed to rinse the cups or dilute the tea.

Not seen in this detail of the painting is the entry of a male servant who is carrying a tall silver pot, which may have contained chocolate or coffee. These two other social beverages of the 18th century were served in cups of a deep cylindrical shape, like the three seen on the end of the table. The shallow, bowl-shaped, handleless teacups and the saucers are arranged in a neat row along one side of the table. The teapot rests on a square tile-like stand or dish that protects the table from the heat. Nearby is a bowl to receive tea dregs, a pot for cream or milk, and a sugar bowl.

The teatime ritual has begun.

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF PICTURES CONSULTED

1700 ca.

_Portrait Group of Gentlemen and a Child._ Believed to be English or Dutch. Reproduced in Ralph Edwards, _Early Conversation Pictures from the Middle Ages to about 1730_, London, 1954, p. 117, no. 73.

1710 ca.

_The Tea-Table._ English. Reproduced in _The Connoisseur Period Guides: The Stuart Period, 1603-1714_, edited by Ralph Edwards and L. G. G. Ramsey, New York, 1957, p. 30.

1720 ca.

_A Family Taking Tea._ English. Reproduced in Edwards, _Early Conversation Pictures_, p. 132, no. 95.

_Two Ladies and a Gentleman at Tea._ Attributed to Nicolaas Verkolje, Dutch. Reproduced in Edwards, _Early Conversation Pictures_, p. 96, no. 42.

_An English Family at Tea_ (frontispiece). Joseph Van Aken(?). Reproduced in Percy Macquoid and Ralph Edwards, _The Dictionary of English Furniture_, revised and enlarged by Ralph Edwards, London, 1954, vol. 1, p. 10, fig. 16.

1725 ca.

_Tea Party in the Time of George I_ (fig. 5). English. Reproduced in _Antiques_, November 1955, vol. 68, p. vi following p. 460.

1730 ca.

_The Assembly at Wanstead House._ By William Hogarth, English. Reproduced in Edwards, _Early Conversation Pictures_, p. 125, no. 87.

_Family._ By William Hogarth, English. Reproduced in R. H. Wilenski, _English Painting_, London, 1933, pl. 11a.

_Family Group_ (fig. 1). By Gawen Hamilton, English. Reproduced in _Antiques_, March 1953, vol. 63, p. 270.

_A Family Party._ By William Hogarth, English. Reproduced in _English Conversation Pictures of the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century_, edited by G. C. Williamson, London, 1931, pl. 10.

1730

_Susanna Truax_ (fig. 2). American. Reproduced in _Art in America_, May 1954, vol. 42, p. 101.