Budge_Ethiopic_Alexander

ALEXANDER AND THE BRAHMANS. 1 29
"come and wouldst do battle with us, turn thee
"back to thy place, because it is unseemly for thee
"to fight with us. For we are poor and needy
"men, and we have neither possessions nor riches,
"and we have only the food which we eat from
"day to day.' We have neither corn nor barley,
"nor flocks nor herds, and we have no business
"of any kind whatsoever, except the worship of
"the glorious God, for our God is the Merciful
"One. We are the remnant which is left of the The Brah-
"children of Seth,^ the son of Adam, whom Godcendedfrom
"Almighty covered over [p, 72] in the hidden place ^''*'
"of His treasures when he sent the flood upon the
"earth.^ In our country there is nothing for which
^ Or, "and we do not eat food except from day to day,"
i. e., we eat one meal a day only.
' According to the Book of Adam and Eve (ed. Malan,
p. iiSf.) Seth and his children lived to the north of the
mountain of the Cave of Treasures; because of their purity
they were called "Children of God". They did no earthly
work, and thought only of singing hymns and psalms unto
God; they neither sowed nor reaped, and they ate the fruit
of the fine trees which grew on their mountain (Compare
KHi eOeujpr|(Tev uXag TroWdg xai bevbpa TToXXd Kai unep-
Ka\a faetd KapirOuv travTobaTTaiv, iTOTaiaov be TrepiKUKXcuvid
6\riv Tiiv THV eKeivriv, ou ^v to ubtup biaqpaveq, XeuKov
ujffei fdXa k. t. X., Meusel, p. 773). The children of Seth
came down from their mountain seduced by the daughters
of Cain, and when they tried to return they found that they
were unable to do so, because they had defiled themselves
with women, whose hands and feet were dyed with colour,
and whose faces had divers tattoo marks on them.
3 The Book of Adam and Eve (ed. Malan, p. 155) states