Tea
came to England ten years later than to the continent. The first
solid evidence of the sale of tea in England is a newspaper
advertisement for the coffeehouse of Thomas Garway in London in
1658. It read: "That excellent and by all physitians approved drink
called by the Chineans tcha, by other nations Tay alias Tea is sold
at Sultaness Head a cophee house in Sweetings Rents by the Royal
Exchange London." Two years later Garway was to issue a lengthy
handbill describing its benefits to health and stating that while
formerly tea had been so scarce as to sell for six to ten pounds
sterling per pound of tea, now Garway was selling it for sixteen to
fifty shillings
Coffeehouse had grown up a decade earlier, with the importation of
beans from the Middle East. In them men, but not women, of all walks
of life could meet for a smoke, companionship, and coffee. At these
"penny universities" as they were called the news of the day was
exchanged. The walls were covered with handbills, playbills, and
broadsheets, and business and political action were discussed. At
one time five hundred such coffeehouse existed in London. They were
favorite hangouts and even places of work, where many writers,
including Dryden, Pope, and Addison and Steele, gathered information
for their early news sheets. Jonathan Swift received letters from
his beloved Stella at the St. James coffeehouse. The world famous
insurance firm, Lloyds of London, is named for the coffeehouse where
it started
Thomas Twining, who went on to build a great tea business, in 1717
opened the first such house strictly for tea - to women as well as
men - and tea began to overtake coffee as the leading non-alcoholic
beverage. Secretary of the Admiralty Samuel Pepys recorded in his
famous diary having his first cup of tea in 1660, and in 1667 that a
druggist recommended it to his wife for her cold.
