rate opium-smoker, who had been
suffering for years from the influence of the poisonous drug. He
tried an infusion of the roasted berries, and was so delighted at
the recovery of his former vigor that in gratitude to the tree he
called it _cahuha_ which in Arabic signifies "force".

Galland, in his analysis of the Arabian manuscript, already referred to,
that has furnished us with the most trustworthy account of the origin of
coffee, criticizes Antoine Faustus Nairon, Maronite professor of
Oriental languages at Rome, who was the author of the first printed
treatise on coffee only,[36] for accepting the legends relating to Omar
and the Abyssinian goatherd. He says they are unworthy of belief as
facts of history, although he is careful to add that there is _some_
truth in the story of the discovery of coffee by the Abyssinian goats
and the abbot who prescribed the use of the berries for his monks, "the
Eastern Christians being willing to have the honor of the invention of
coffee, for the abbot, or prior, of the convent and his companions are
only the mufti Gemaleddin and Muhammid Alhadrami, and the monks are the
dervishes."

Amid all these details, Jardin reaches the conclusion that it is to
chance we must attribute the knowledge of the properties of coffee, and
that the coffee tree was transported from its native land to Yemen, as
far as Mecca, and possibly into Persia, before being carried into Egypt.

Coffee, being thus favorably introduced into Aden, it has continued
there ever since, without interruption. By degrees the cultivation of
the plant and the use of the beverage passed into many neighboring
places. Toward the close of the fifteenth century (1470-1500) it reached
Mecca and Medina, where it was introduced, as at Aden, by the dervishes,
and for the same religious purpose. About 1510 it reached Grand Cairo in
Egypt, where the dervishes from Yemen, living in a district by
themselves, drank coffee on the nights they intended to spend in
religious devotion. They kept it in a large red earthen vessel--each in
turn receiving it, respectfully, from their superior, in a small bowl,
which he dipped into the jar--in the meantime chanting their prayers,
the burden of which was always: "There is no God but one God, the true
King, whose power is not to be disputed."

[Illustration: A BOUQUET OF RIPE FRUIT]

[Illustration: FLOWERS, FRUIT, AND LEAVES]

[Illustration: THE COFFEE TREE BEARS FRUIT, LEA