which were the Sun and Moon, and round about them a guard of priests of the Sun and Moon. And there stood the two trees of which they had spoken, like unto cypress trees; and round about them were trees like the myrobolans of Egypt, and with similar fruit. And I addressed the two trees that were in the midst of the park, the one which was male in the masculine gender, and the one that was female in the feminine gender. And the name of the male tree was the Sun, and of the female tree the Moon, names which were in that language Muthu and Emaüsae. And the stems were clothed with the skins of animals; the male tree with the skins of he-beasts, and the female tree with the skins of she-beasts.... And at the setting of the Sun a voice, speaking in the Indian tongue, came forth from the (Sun) tree; and I ordered the Indians who were with me to interpret it. But they were afraid and would not.”

Maundeville informs us precisely where the trees are—“A fifteen journeys in lengthe, goyinge be the deserts of the tother side of the Ryvere Beumare,” if one could only tell where that is. A mediæval chronicler also tells us that Ogerus, the Dane (temp. Caroli Magni), conquered all the parts beyond sea from Hierusalem to the Trees of the Sun. In the old Italian romance also of Guerino detto il Meschino, still a chap book in south Italy, the hero visits the Trees of the Sun and Moon.

It will be observed that the letter ascribed to Alexander describes the two oracular trees as resembling two cypress trees. As such the Trees of the Sun and Moon are represented on several extant ancient medals, e.g., on two struck at Perga, in Pamphylia, in the time of Aurelian. An Eastern story tells us of two vast cypress trees, sacred among the Magians, which grew in Khorasan, one at Kashmar near Turshiz, and the other at Farmad near Tuz, and which were said to have risen from shoots that Zoroaster brought from paradise. The former of these was sacrilegiously cut down by the order of the Khalif Motawakkil, in the ninth century. The trunk was dispatched to Baghdad on rollers at a vast expense, whilst the branches alone formed a load for 1,300 camels. The night that the convoy reached within one stage of the palace, the Khalif was cut in pieces by his own guards. This tree was said to be 1,450 years old, and to measure 33¾ cubits in girth. The locality of this “Arbol Sol” we see was in Khorasan, and possibly its fame may have been transferred to a representative of another species. The plane as well as the cypress was one of the distinctive trees of the Magian paradise.

In the Peutingerian Tables we find in the north-east of Asia the rubric, “Hic Alexander Responsum accepit,” which looks very like an allusion to the tale of the Oracular Trees. If so, it is remarkable as a suggestion of the antiquity of the Alexandrian legends, though the rubric may of course be an interpolation. The Trees of the Sun and Moon appear as located in India Ultima to the east of Persia, in a map which is found in MSS. (12th century) of the Floridus of Lambertus; and they are indicated more or less precisely in several maps of the succeeding centuries.

Marco has mixed up this legend of the Alexandrian romance on the authority, as we have reason to believe, of some of the re-compilers of that romance, with a famous subject of Christian legend in that age, the Arbre Sec or Dry Tree, one form of which is related by Maundeville and by Johan Schiltberger. “A lytille fro Ebron,” says the former, “is the Mount of Mambre, of the whyche the Valeye taketh his name. And there is a tree of Oke that the Saracens clepen Dirpe, that is of Abraham’s Tyme, the which men clepen the Dry Tree. And theye saye that it hath ben this sithe the beginnynge of the World; and was sumtyme grene and bare Leves, unto the Tyme that Oure Lord dyede on the Cross; and thanne it dryede; and so dyden alle the Trees that weren thanne in the World. And summe seyn he here Prophecyes that a Lord, a Prynce of the West syde of the World, shall wynnen the Land of Promyssioum, i.e. the Holy Land, withe Helpe of Cristene Men, and he halle do synge a Masse under that Drye Tree, and than the Tree shall wexen grene and bere both Fruyt and Leves. And thorghe that Myracle manye Sarazines and Jewes schulle hev turned to Cristene Feithe. And, therefore, they dan gret Worschippe thereto, and kepen it fulle besyly. And alle be it so that it be drye, natheloss yet be herethe great vertu, &c.”

The tradition seems to have altered with circumstances, for a traveller of nearly two centuries later (Friar Anselmo, 1590), describes the oak of Abraham at Hebron as a tree of dense and verdant foliage:—“The Saracens make their devotions at it, and hold it in great veneration, for it has remained thus green from the days of Abraham until now; and they tie scraps of cloth on its branches inscribed with some of their writing, and believe that if any one were to cut a piece off that tree he would die within the year.” Indeed, even before Maundeville’s time, Friar Burchard (1283) had noticed that though the famous old tree was dry, another had sprung from its roots.

As long ago as the time of Constantine a fair was held under the Terebink of Maimre, which was the object of many superstitious rites and excesses. The Emperor ordered these to be put a stop to, and a church to be erected on the spot. In the time of Arculph (end of 7th century), the dry trunk still existed under the roof of this church.

There are several Dry Tree stories among the wonders of Buddhism; one is that of a sacred tree visited by the Chinese pilgrims to India, which had grown from the twig which Sakya in Hindu fashion had used as a tooth-brush; and I think there is a like story in our own country of the Glastonbury Thorn having grown from the staff of Joseph of Arimathea.

He who injured the holy tree of Bostam, we are told, perished the same day; a general belief in regard to those Trees of Grace of which we have already seen instances in regard to the sacred trees of Zoroaster and the Oak of Hebron. We find the same belief in Eastern Africa, where certain trees, regarded by the natives with superstitious reverence, which they express by driving in votive nails and suspending rags, are known to the European residents by the vulgar name of Devil Trees. Burton relates a case of the verification of the superstition in the death of an English merchant who had cut down such a tree, and of four members of his household. (See note on p. 120 of Yule’s “Marco Polo’s Travels,” vol. I.)

The writer of an article in the Cornhill Magazine of November, 1874, on the Gonds and Bygas of the Eastern Sathpuras (Central Provinces, India), says—

“My endeavours to obtain a clear insight into their ways were so far successful, that after a time they did not object to my being present at their domestic ceremonies, and gradually the Byga priests supplied me with all the information they could give as to their curious custom of tree culture and spirit worship.

“All that they could tell did not throw much light on the subject, for even to the Bygas themselves it is extremely vague and mysterious; but the contrast between their acknowledged hatred of trees as a rule, and their deep veneration of certain others in particular, is very curious.

“I have seen hill-sides swept clear of forests for miles, with but here and there a solitary tree left standing. These remain now the objects of the deepest veneration, and receive offerings of food, clothes, or flowers from the passing Byga, who firmly believes that tree to be the home of a spirit.”

Captain J. S. F. Mackenzie, some years ago, contributed a paper to the Indian Antiquary on Tree and Serpent Worship in Mysore. He said that round about