Page:Beckford - Vathek (1816).djvu/259

(249) earth, like a ring encompassing a finger. The sun was believed to rise from one of its eminences, (as over Oeta, by the Latin poets) and to set on the opposite; whence, from Kaf to Kaf, signified from one extremity of the earth to the other. The fabulous historians of the East affirm, that this mountain was founded upon a stone, called sakhrat, one grain of which, according to Lokman, would enable the possessor to work wonders. This stone is further described as the pivot of the earth; and said to be one vast emerald, from the refraction of whose beams, the heavens derive their azure. It is added, that whenever God would excite an earthquake, he commands the stone to move one of its fibres, (which supply in it the office of nerves) and, that being moved, the part of the earth connected with it, quakes, is convulsed, and sometimes expands. Such is the philosophy of the Koran!—

The Tarikh Tabari, written in Persian, analagous to the same tradition, relates, that, were it not for this emerald, the earth would be liable to perpetual commotions and unfit for the abode of mankind.