[We read in the Si Shi Ki, of Ch’ang Te, Chinese Envoy to Hulaku (1259), translated by Dr. Bretschneider (Med.  Res. I. p. 151):  “The kinkang tsuan (diamonds) come from Yin-du (Hindustan).  The people take flesh and throw it into the great valleys (of the mountains).  Then birds come and eat this flesh, after which diamonds are found in their excrements.”—­H.C.] It is told in two different versions, once of the Diamond, and again of the Jacinth of Serendib, in the work on precious stones by Ahmed Taifashi.  It is one of the many stories in the scrap-book of Tzetzes.  Nicolo Conti relates it of a mountain called Albenigaras, fifteen days’ journey in a northerly Direction from Vijayanagar; and it is told again, apparently after Conti, by Julius Caesar Scaliger.  It is related of diamonds and Balasses in the old Genoese MS., called that of Usodimare.  A feeble form of the tale is quoted contemptuously by Garcias from one Francisco de Tamarra.  And Haxthausen found it as a popular legend in Armenia. (S.  Epiph. de XIII. Gemmis, etc., Romae, 1743; Jaubert, Edrisi, I. 500; J.A.S.B. XIII. 657; Lane’s Ar.  Nights, ed. 1859, III. 88; Rem.  Nouv.  Mel.  Asiat. I. 183; Raineri, Fior di Pensieri di Ahmed Teifascite, pp. 13 and 30; Tzetzes, Chil. XI. 376; India in XVth Cent. pp. 29-30; J.  C. Scal. de Subtilitate, CXIII.  No. 3; An. des Voyages, VIII. 195; Garcias, p. 71; Transcaucasia, p. 360; J.A.S.B. I. 354.)

The story has a considerable resemblance to that which Herodotus tells of the way in which cinnamon was got by the Arabs (III. 111).  No doubt the two are ramifications of the same legend.

NOTE 3.—­Here buckram is clearly applied to fine cotton stuffs.  The districts about Masulipatam were long famous both for muslins and for coloured chintzes.  The fine muslins of Masalia are mentioned in the Periplus.  Indeed even in the time of Sakya Muni Kalinga was already famous for diaphanous muslins, as may be seen in a story related in the Buddhist Annals. (J.A.S.B. VI. 1086.)

CHAPTER XX.

CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF LAR WHENCE THE BRAHMINS COME.

Lar is a Province lying towards the west when you quit the place where the Body of St. Thomas lies; and all the Abraiaman in the world come from that province.[NOTE 1]

You must know that these Abraiaman are the best merchants in the world, and the most truthful, for they would not tell a lie for anything on earth. [If a foreign merchant who does not know the ways of the country applies to them and entrusts his goods to them, they will take charge of these, and sell them in the most loyal manner, seeking zealously the profit of the foreigner and asking no commission except what he pleases to bestow.] They eat no flesh, and drink no wine, and live a life of great chastity, having intercourse with no women except with their wives; nor would they on any account take what belongs to another; so their law commands.  And they are all distinguished by wearing a thread of cotton over one shoulder and tied under the other arm, so that it crosses the breast and the back.