Its flavour and aroma
are quite foreign to the ordinary coffee drinker. The contaminated
beverage is regarded as pure, and the genuine article is soundly
condemned as an imposition, and the seller of it is liable to be accused
of fraud. It is in a similar position to the good grape brandy which
Victorians produce, and which drinkers of some imported stuff (described
as one part cognac and three parts silent spirit) fail to recognise as
real brandy. If coffee is not muddy and thick and does not possess a
mawkish twang of liquorice, it is suspected. The delicate aromatic
flavour, the fragrant odour, the genial and stimulant effects are now
almost unknown, except in limited circles. North Queensland is capable of
growing far more than sufficient coffee for the Commonwealth, but coffee
is not a popular Australian beverage, and as it entirely loses its
specific balsam and identity under the manipulation of manufacturers, it
cannot get the chance of becoming popular. Australian wines, Australian
spirits and Australian coffee might well be the popular beverages of
Australians. But preference is given to foreign importations, of the
genuineness of some of which there are strong grounds for suspicion; or
in the case of coffee its elements are so disguised by adulteration that
a revolution in public taste must take place before it can possibly find
general favour.
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