70 THE TRAVELS OF
throw our law, and blasphemed the Prophet." Then the emperor said to him : " Most cruel hound, when thou saw-est that God had twice delivered them from the fire how couldst thou dare thus to inflict death upon them ? " And having spoken thus, he ordered him with his whole family to be cut in sunder. Such a death therefore as he caused those brethren to undergo to their glory, he himself had now to undergo to his own damnation. And the Cadi hearing of this fled from the city, and from the emperor's dominions.
Now in that country it is the custom never to bury the dead, but bodies are only cast out in the fields, and thus are speedily destroyed and consumed by the excessive heat. So the bodies of these friars lay for fourteen days in the sun, and yet were found quite fresh and undecayed as if on the very day of their glorious martyrdom. And the Christians who were in that place seeing this took the bodies; and caused them to be committed to the tomb.'
13. How Fr. Odoric took up the bones of the four Friars ; and the
wonders wrought thereby.
Then I, Friar Odoric, came into those regions, having heard of their glorious martyrdom, and opening their tombs I humbly and devoutly took up their bones. And as God ofttimes worketh great marvels by means of his saints, through these also it pleased him to work powerfully. Thus when I had taken their bones, and wrapt them in fair napkins, and accompanied by one brother of the order and a servant, I was taking them to the house of our friars at a certain place in Upper India,~ I chanced to lodge in the house of a certain man, and when I went to sleep I placed those bones, or sacred reliques rather as I would call them,
It is remarkable that Odoric seems purposely to avoid all mention of Jordanus in connection with this, though we know that it was he who carried off the bodies and buried them at Supera. (Friar Jord., p. vii.) 2 Upper India with Odoric is China.
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