South India and her Muhammadan Invaders c15.s1.2

c15.s1.2

At the end of three days, we returned by ‘Mother’s Road’, and encamped near the grotto of Cheim, which is the same as Seth, son of Adam. We afterwards stayed near the bay full of fish, and the villages of Cormolah, of Djbercavern, of Diedineouch and of Atkalendjeh. It is in this last named place that the sheik Abon’abd Allah, son of the Khafif, spent the winter. All these villages and stations are situated on the mountain. Near the foot of the latter, on this same road, stands ‘dirakht rewan,’ ‘the walking tree’, an ancient tree that does not lose a single leaf. I have not met any one who has seen its leaves. It is given the prefix ‘walking’ because the person who looks at it from the mountain top, thinks it stands far away at the foot of the mountain, whilst he who looks at it from below, believes it to be in quite the opposite place. I met a troop of Yogees who never leave the foot of the mountain but are waiting for the leaves of this tree to fall. It stands in an absolutely inaccessible spot. Idolators say: ‘whosoever eats the leaves of this tree, recovers his youth, even though he be an old man.’ But this is false, another of their lies.