All kinds of rare and curious plants and trees, particularly the cedar and cocoa-tree, grow here in great abundance, and there are pearl-fisheries on the coast, at the mouth of the rivers; some of its valleys also produce diamonds. I made a devotional journey up the mountain, to the spot where Adam was placed on his banishment from Paradise; and I had the curiosity to ascend to the summit. When I came back to the city, I entreated the king to grant me permission to return to my native country, which he did in the most obliging and honourable manner. He compelled me to receive a rich present, which was taken from his treasury; and when I went to take my leave, he deposited in my care another still more considerable than the first, and at the same time gave me a letter for the Commander of the Believers, our sovereign lord, saying, “I beg you to present from me this letter, and this present to the Caliph Haroun Alraschid, and to assure him of my friendship.” I took the present and the letter, with the greatest respect, and promised his majesty to execute the orders with which he was pleased to honour me, with the greatest punctuality. Before I embarked, the king sent for the captain and the merchants with whom I was to sail, and charged them to pay me all possible attention. The letter of the king of Serendid was written on the skin of a certain animal, highly prized in that country on account of its rareness. The colour of it approaches to yellow. The letter itself was in characters of azure, and it contained the following words in the Indian language: THE KING OF THE INDIES, WHO IS PRECEDED BY A THOUSAND ELEPHANTS; WHO LIVES IN A PALACE, THE ROOF OF WHICH GLITTERS WITH THE LUSTRE OF AN HUNDRED THOUSAND RUBIES, AND WHO POSSESSES IN HIS TREASURY TWENTY THOUSAND CROWNS ENRICHED WITH DIAMONDS, TO THE CALIPH HAROUN ALRASCHID. “Although the present that we send you be inconsiderable, yet receive it as a brother and a friend, in consideration of the friendship we bear you in our heart; and we feel happy in having an opportunity of testifying it to you. We ask the same share in your affections, as we hope we deserve it; being of a rank equal to that you hold. We salute you as a brother. Farewell.” The present consisted, first, of a vase made of one single ruby, pierced and worked into a cup of half a foot in height, and an inch thick, filled with fine round pearls, all weighing half a drachm each: secondly, the skin of a serpent, which had scales as large as a common piece of money, the peculiar property of which was to preserve those who lay on it from all disease: thirdly, fifty thousand drachms of the most exquisite aloe-wood, together with thirty grains of camphor as large as a pistachio-nut; and lastly, all this was accompanied by a female slave of the most enchanting beauty, whose clothes were covered with jewels.