means of consulting. Adam being about to die, and in great fear of death, earnestly desired to obtain a branch of this Tree, thinking that so he might escape the dreadful effects which his sin had brought into the world, and he sent one of his sons to the gate of Paradise to solicit this favour. The son accordingly made his petition to the cherub who guarded the gate, and that angel gave him a bough, to the end that that which had been appointed might be fulfilled; for meanwhile Adam had departed. The son therefore planted it on his grave; and it struck root and became a great tree, and attracted the whole nature of Adam to its nutriment.
The Tree, with the bones of Adam from beneath it, was preserved in the Ark. After the waters had abated, Noah divided the bones as relics among his sons. The skull fell to the share of Shem, and he buried it on a mountain of Judæa, called from thence Golgotha, Calvary, or the Place of a Skull. The Tree was
