The professors of the excellent faith and the Moslem historians agree, that in Kashmir or Kashmar,[459] a place celebrated for female beauty, a dependency of Naishapur, there was formerly a cypress[460] planted by Zardusht for king Gushtasp, the like of which was never seen before or since, for beauty, height, or straightness: mention of this tree having been made at the court of Mutawakkal[461] when he was engaged in building the _Sarman raï_, or _Samarah_[462] palace in the Jâafriyah,[463] the Khalif felt a great desire to behold it: and as it was not in his power to go to Khorasan, he wrote to _Abdallah Táhir Zavalimin_, “possessor of happiness,” to have the tree cut down, fastened on rollers, and sent to Baghdád. When intelligence of this came to the people of the district and the inhabitants of Khorasan, they assembled at the foot of the tree, imploring for mercy with tears and lamentations, and exhibiting a scene of general desolation. The professors of the excellent faith offered the governor fifty thousand dinars to spare the tree, but the offer was refused. When the cypress was felled, it caused great detriment to the buildings and water-courses of the country; the birds of different kinds which had built their nests on it issued forth in such countless myriads as to darken the air, screaming out in agony with various tones of distress: the very oxen, sheep, and other animals which reposed under its sheltering shade, commenced such piteous moans of woe that it was impossible to listen to them. The expense of conveying the trunk to Baghdad was five hundred thousand dinars; the very branches loaded one thousand and three hundred camels. When the tree had reached one station from the Jaafriyah quarter, on that same night, Mutawakkal the Abasside was cut in pieces by his own guards,[464] so that he never beheld the tree. Some Muhammedan writers state the circumference of the trunk at twenty-seven _táziáynah_, each a cubit and a quarter long, and also that fourteen hundred and fifty years had elapsed from the time of its being planted to the year 232 of the Hejirah (846, A. D.).[465] The Behdínians say that Zardusht brought with him from paradise a branch which he planted at the gate of the fire temple of Kashmir, and which grew up into this tree: but some sages maintain that, according to the intelligent, this tradition signifies: 1. that there is in vegetables a simple uncompounded soul; and 2. that paradise is the world of beings of that class. Some Yezdanians say that Zardusht prayed the superintending lord of cypress-trees, whom they call _Azrawán_, to nourish carefully the offspring of this shoot. They also relate, on the authority of a holy _Hakim_, “doctor,”[466] who said: “I saw the Lord of the cypress, and he declared: ‘I have given orders to slay Mutawakkal for the crime of cutting down this tree.’” Muhammed Kuli Salim also says: