52 



JOURNAL R. A. S. CEYLON. 



[EXTRA NO-. 



The people of old have cut in the rock steps of a kind, by 

 help of which you ascend; fixed into them are iron stanchions, to 

 which are suspended chains, so that one making the ascent can 

 hold onto them.* These chains are ten in number, thus: — two at 

 the foot of the mountain [Peak] at the place of the gate-way; 

 seven in contiguity after the two first; and the tenth, that is f the 

 chain of the profession of faith (Islam),'' so named because a person 

 who has reached it and looks back at the foot of the mountain 

 will be seized with hallucinations, and, for fear of falling, he will 

 xecite the words u I bear witness that there is no God but God, 

 ^ndthat Muhammad is his prophet." When you have passed this 

 chain, you will find a path badly kept. From the tenth chain to 

 * the cave of Khidhr^ is seven miles. This cave is situate at an 

 open place, and it has near it a spring of water full of fish, and 

 this also bears the name of Khidhr. ISTo one may catch these 

 fish. Near the cave are two basins cut in the rock, one on each 



at length as an illustration of the habit of missionary religions to annex and 

 adapt the shrines and idols of local worship. The fig-tree in question was, I 

 have little doubt, a bo tree, surrounded by a wall and altars like the Mahd 

 Vihdre at Anuradhapura. It is likely to have been credited with healing 

 powers, and so to have preserved its influence in the locality from the decay of 

 Buddhism in Malabar, through the centuries of Brahmanish reaction, until at 

 length the followers of the Prophet contrived by means of the fancied inscrip- 

 tion to control the superstitious faith of its devotees. The similar attempt of 

 the Muhammadans to annex the Sri-pada of Samanala, by claiming it as the 

 foot-print of Adam, has done nothing towards the conversion of the Sinhalese. 

 The Hindus claim it as that of Siva or Vishnu, according to their sect. 

 (Skeen's Adam's Peak, p. 27.) 



* These chains are spoken of by Marco Polo in the previous century. 

 " Furthermore you must know that on this Island of Seilan there is an exceed- 

 ing high mountain ; it rises right up so steep and precipitous that no one could 

 ascend it, were it not that they have taken and fixed to it several great massive 

 iron chains, so disposed that by help of these men are able to mount to the 

 top."— Yule, Marco Polo, Vol. II., p. 256. 



f See, as to the identity of this saint or prophet, Dr. Lee's note, and Sell, 

 1 Faith of Islam/ p. 260.— JS. 



