Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/253

 was naturally much distressed, and went and informed her relations how she had seen the beauty of her person suddenly vanish on the utterance of a few words by a penitent hermit. At the entreaties of her family Meurasab offered up a second prayer, which resulted in the restoration of the lost charms.

A further example of his miraculous power supplies an explanation of the fact that the Achehnese were readily persuaded by the foreigners who visited their country to revere this pious recluse as the protector of navigation.

The captain of a ship, whose vessel was on the point of foundering owing to a leak, vowed that he would make a handsome offering in the name of Meurasab if the leak were stopped through his intercession. Our saint was at that moment sitting under the razor of a barber, and held, as is customary with Orientals, a small mirror in his hand to direct the operator in his work. Feeling that his aid was invoked, he flung away his mirror. By Allah's help it made its way through air and water till it found its destination beneath the ship and stopped the leak, so that both vessel and cargo came safe to land.

The vows, however, that are made to this saint in Acheh, are by no means confined to ships and sailors.

His intervention is also invoked on behalf of sick children. The vow in such cases consists in the promise of a gold or silver hand, or "the height of the child in gold" (santeut dong) in the event of recovery. Such hands or pieces of gold thread (woven as thin as possible) are given to Kling traders journeying to Madras, who undertake their transmission to Nagore.

Other vows are fulfilled at the place of abode of those who make them. Even the payment of what has been promised to the great saints of Acheh as recompense for their intercession does not always involve a visit to their graves. Suppose for instance that the master of a vessel, while in danger at sea, has vowed a goat to Tuen Meurasab for his safe return, he kills the goat in his own gampōng, makes a kanduri with it and requests the teungku to recite over it the fātiḥah (the first chapter of the Qurān) for the benefit of the saint.

The "anniversary" of the saint is occasionally celebrated in Kuta Raja