Today is the one hundred and sixtieth anniversary of the death of Charles Grey, the second Earl Grey, whose recipe for tea flavoured with bergamot – given to him, according to legend, by a Chinese mandarin whose life he saved – has proved enduringly popular. To mark the occasion I have chosen one of the earliest known depictions of English people drinking tea. A Family of Three at Tea was painted by Richard Collins in 1727 and may be seen in the British Galleries of the Victoria and Albert Museum, in London.

 

Richard Collins was a portrait painter and topographical draughtsman who lived in Peterborough and painted in and around the counties of Lincolnshire and Leicestershire. Little is known about him other than that he died in 1732 and that he was a freemason. According to a contemporary source, he “initiated several persons of Spalding and other towns in freemasonry.” Perhaps the family drinking tea in the picture reproduced on this page were among those “several persons”. They brandish porcelain tea bowls imported from China, enjoying the novel luxury of a hot beverage from the Far East. The English teacup with a handle had not yet been invented and they are clearly doing their best not to burn their fingers. The formality with which the tea-table before them is laid, the darkness of the interior in which they sit, and the self-conscious, slightly secretive elegance with which they present themselves to the gaze of posterity, lends the scene the air of a private rite. The silence is broken only by the yapping of a lapdog, who looks as though he would like a sip of tea from the bowl held, so gingerly and deliberately, by the lady of the house. Perhaps it was her custom...

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