First published: London : Hutchinson, 2009, with title For all the tea in China : espionage, empire, and the secret formula for the world's favourite drink.

Booklist starred, February 2010

Describes the efforts of the British East India Company to acquire the secrets and seedlings to begin producing their own teas in the mid-nineteenth century and details the role of Robert Fortune, a Scottish gardener and botanist who was disguised and sent in to smuggle tea plants out of China and transport them to the foothills of the Himalayas.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [251]-254) and index.

Prologue -- Min River, China, 1845 -- East India House, City of London, January 12, 1848 -- Chelsea Physic Garden, May 7, 1848 -- Shanghai to Hangzhou, September 1848 -- Zhejiang Province near Hangzhou, October 1848 -- A green tea factory, Yangtze River, October 1848 -- House of Wang, Anhui Province, November 1848 -- Shanghai at the Lunar New Year, January 1849 -- Calcutta Botanic Garden, March 1849 -- Saharunpur, North-West Provinces, June 1849 -- Ningbo to Bohea, the Great Tea Road, May and June 1849 -- Bohea, July 1849 -- Pucheng, September 1849 -- Shanghai, Autumn 1849 -- Shanghai, February 1851 -- Himalayan Mountains, May 1851 -- Royal Small Arms Factory, Enfield Lock, 1852 -- Tea for the Victorians -- Fortune's story.

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