greater portion of this district is mountainous, the only plain being the narrow stripe on the coast. It is watered by numberless mountain-streams, but it is less highly cultivated than the terraces of Lebanon. The chief productions are wheat, barley, and cotton; but tobacco chiefly in the district of Latakia. A great part of Mount Lebanon is included in this pashalic, which is divided into 14 districts: viz. 1. Djebbel Beshirai, a considerable tract to the E. of Tripoli, and which contains 12 villages, of which Antoura, Beshirai, and Canobin are the chief.-2. El Zawye, a small district in Lower Lebanon.-3. Batroon, a village with a small district on the seacoast.-4. El Koura, in the lower part of Lebanon divided from El Zawye by the Nahr Kadisha.-5. El Fetouh to the E. of Djebail, and bordering on the Kesraouan.-6. Akoura, a small district with a village of the same name, the seat of a Maronite bishop.-7. El Dennye, to the N. and N.W. of Beshirai.-8. Djebail, a district on the coast belonging to the town of that name.-9. Djebbel-el-Meneitra, a Mutualee district in the days of Niebuhr.-10. El Hermel, on the eastern declivity of Lebanon towards Baalbec.-11. El Kataa, E. of Batroon.—12. El Kella.—13. El Shara.14. Tortosa on the coast, and 15. El Akkar, the northern declivity of Lebanon. But this last district is, in all probability, the same as the Akoura of Niebuhr. To these must be added the mountainous territories of the Anzeyries and Ismaelians extending from the Nahr el Kebir or great river to the N. of Latakia. The Mutualees formerly possessed 7 districts in this pashalic for two centuries, but they were expelled by Yousef, emir of the Druses, and they in their turn seized the Belad Baalbec, and drove out the inhabitants. They are now reduced to a very small number. The whole of the Libanus which belongs to the pashalic of Tripoli is now in the hands of the emir of the Druses, who pays the miri or capitationtax, amounting to 130 purses, collecting for himself more than 600 purses. Latakia.] Coming from the N. Latakia is the first place of consequence. This district formed part of the ancient Casiotis, so called from mount Casius, a range of hills extending N. to the Orontes. Latakia, the ancient Laodicea ad mare was built by Seleucus Nicator, who named it in honour of his mother. It stands on the N.W. side of Cape Ziarat, an elevated promontory which advances half a league into the sea. Though formerly a commercial city of considerable importance, being the port of Aleppo, its commerce is now declined in consequence of the decline of Aleppo, and it does not now contain above 4000 souls, though 30 years ago it contained 10,000 inhabitants. It is subject to earthquakes, one of which in 1796 nearly destroyed the place. Several Roman antiquities are still to be found here.

Jebilee, &c.] To the S. of this is Jebilee, the ancient Gabala, now a place of no consequence.—From Latakia to Tortosa is almost a continued succession of ruins along a vast rich plain at the foot of the Anzeyrey mountains, of no great height.-Tartous or Tortosa, the ancient Orthosia, a place of great consequence during the crusades, has nothing remaining but its castle, which is very large and still inhabited. A large Christian church belonging to the place still stands almost entire, but is now converted into a stall for cattle.-S. of this is the isle of Ruad, the Arvad of Scripture, and the Aradus of the Greeks. The island is now deserted, and a bare rock, without a single trace of those numerous houses that once covered it. Opposite to it, on the continent, are the supposed ruins of the Simyra of Strabo inhabited by the Zemarites of Scripture.

Tripoli.] South of this is the modern Tripoli, composed of three cities,

a furlong distant from each other, but which at length were joined by their respective suburbs. It is built on the declivity of the lowest hills of the Libanus, about half an hour from the shore. It is the neatest town in all Syria, the houses being all well-built of stone, and neatly constructed within. It is surrounded with luxuriant gardens, producing abundance of oranges and lemons, and extending over the whole triangular space between the town and the sea. The city is divided into two parts by the Wady Kadesha, which enters the plain through a beautiful narrow valley, and after traversing the town falls into the sea about the northern side of the triangle. It is a shallow rapid stream at its mouth, not even navigable by boats. On the summit of the hill on the N. side of the river stands the tomb of Abou Nazer; and opposite on the S. side, just where the Kadesha enters the town, is the citadel, which commands both the town and the whole plain below, but which is itself commanded by the height on the opposite side of the river, only 150 yards distant. This citadel is an old Saracenic building, as ancient as the epoch of the crusades, and has lately been completely repaired by Berber Aga. Tripoli is the most favoured spot in all Syria, as the maritime plain and neighbouring mountains place every variety of clime within a short distance of the inhabitants, and the Wady Kadesha is the most picturesque of valleys. Yet the situation, however beautiful, is not healthy; and from July to September epidemic fevers prevail here, as at Scanderoon and Cyprus. These are owing to the practice of inundating the gardens, in order to water the mulberry-trees, that they may be sufficiently invigorated to put forth a second foliage. The town, moreover, being open only to the W., the air has no circulation, and a constant feeling of lassitude is experienced, which renders health there never beyond convalescence. The population of the place is estimated at 16,000, one-third of whom are Greek Christians under a bishop. The commerce of Tripoli, once considerable, has been on the decline ever since the destruction of the French trade. The chief article of export is silk, both raw and manufactured; the other articles are sponges, soap, and alkali for making it. Candian soap, which contains very little alkali, is imported, but one-fourth of its weight of alkali being here added to it, it is resold to great advantage. Galls from the Anzeyrey mountains, yellow wax from Lebanon, and madder, form other articles of exportation. The position of this place is in 35° 44′ 20′′ E. long., and 34° 26′ 26′′ N. lat.

Batroon.] S. of Tripoli is the ancient Botrys, now Batroon, founded by Ithobal king of Tyre, about the time of the prophet Elijah. It still contains about 400 houses, and is the see of a Maronite bishop.-S. of Batroon is Djebail, 3 hours' journey distant. This place was the abode of the ancient Giblites who furnished Hiram with stone-squarers in preparing materials for Solomon's temple, and the Tyrians with caulkers.

Interior or Mountain Districts.] The part of the Lebanon chain within this pashalic is called the Kesraouan, the Castravan of the crusades, as mentioned before. It is chiefly possessed by the Maronites. The convent of Canobin is the residence of the Maronite patriarch; and may be considered as the capital of the Maronite community. It is merely a collection of cells, hermitages, and monasteries, with a church. Ten hours' distance, including stoppages by the way, from Tripoli (for distances here are not measured by miles as in Europe, but by time) is the delightful village of Eden near the famed cedars of Lebanon. It contains a population of 500 families, who quit the place on the approach of winter, and descend the mountains to the village of Zgarti, an hour's dis

tance from Tripoli. Eden is within 5 miles of the cedars, so renowned in sacred and profane history; and in all probability these lofty trees anciently grew much nearer the village of Eden, as we read in Ezekiel of the trees of Eden as the choicest and best of Lebanon.40

6

II. PALESTINE, OR THE HOLY LAND.

the

Introductory Remarks.] We have at length arrived at the most interesting of all countries on the face of the globe, whether morally or physically considered. This once favoured spot was originally called Canaan from its first inhabitants; but was afterwards designated by other appellations, as the Land of Promise; the Land of God; the Holy Land; the Pleasant Land; and emphatically, the Land,' and Land flowing with milk and honey.' It was also called the Land of Judah,' from Judah the principal tribe; and Judæa after the return from the Babylonish captivity, when the inhabitants were called Jehudim or Jews. It was also called Palestine from the Philistines who inhabit part of the sea-coast, and this was the appellation most commonly used by Roman and ecclesiastical writers, when it became a province of the Roman empire after the expulsion of the Jews. In more modern times it has been generally called the Holy Land' amongst Christians, as being the only section of the globe where the worship of the true God was preserved and perpetuated for more than 15 centuries, and, above all, as being honoured by the personal advent of the great Messiah, the root and the offspring of David, who was at once David's son and David's Lord, and as being the grand theatre where the mystery of man's redemption was accomplished by the vicarious sufferings of Christ. In short the circumstances connected with the ancient history of this land, and of them who inhabited it, render this small spot of more interest and importance in the eye of him who reads, and studies, and understands his Bible, than any other portion of the habitable globe; and hence the eager solicitude of all classes of Christians to know something of the geography of a spot associated in their minds with so many interesting and hallowed circumstances. Yet subjected as it has been for a period of nearly twelve centuries to the dominion of a people and a faith above all others hostile to Christianity, we are but imperfectly acquainted with its internal topo

40 It is somewhat strange that the name of this village has escaped the notice of former travellers, as it is undoubtedly the very place intended by the prophet, and not the primeval Eden. The famous cedar-trees are now reduced to seven, and these venerable patriarchs of the vegetable world are fast hastening to utter extinction. In the middle of the 15th century their number was 28; in 1575, 24; in 1650, 23; in 1696, 16; in 1733, 15; and, in 1810, Burckhardt counted only 11 or 12; and, finally, in 1818, Dr Richardson found only 7. It is probable that within less than half a century not one of them will be found. It is impossible to state the age of these cedars. The inhabitants devoutly believe them to be the remains of the identical forest which furnished the timber of Solomon's temple some three thousand years since; and every year, on the day of the transfiguration, the Maronites, the Greeks, and the Armenians, celebrate mass here at the foot of a cedar, upon a homely altar of stone. It is certain that the cedars now standing were ancient trees several hundred years ago. It has been a common, though very erroneous notion, that the cedars stand in the midst of perpetual How cedars or any trees whatsoever can grow amidst constant snow is quite inconceivable, and it is equally so that any should have believed it. There can be no vegetation even of lichens where the snow never melts, and much less can it be supposed that such enormous trees as the cedars can vegetate at all in such a case. There is always a line of demarcation between trees and snow in all such mountains as are covered more or less with perpetual snow, and the same is the case in such parts of Lebanon as attain that elevation. The fact is, that where the cedars stand, the snow begins to melt in April, and is totally dissolved by the end of July, except in such cavities as are inaccessible to the solar rays.

snow.

graphy, and its natural history. Indeed this country never will, and never can be properly explored in its present political state. It must be delivered from Turkish oppression and Mahommedan bigotry,—it must be cleared of all the rubbish brought into it by the superstitious Helena, and perpetuated by those hosts of monks who have nestled in it ever since, and be brought under a regular, efficient and enlightened system of government, before we can expect such accounts of its physical geography and natural history as will satisfy the curiosity of the rational and enlightened mind, and enable us to compare the ancient with the modern Palestine.

CHAP. I.-POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY.

THE Holy Land is at present under the dominion of two pashas,-those of Acre and Damascus the one ruling the coast, the other the interior. Till lately the coast was divided into two pashalics,-those of Acre and Gaza: the former extending from the vicinity of Djebail nearly to Jaffa,— and the latter from Jaffa to El Arish. These two have been very recently united, and now form the pashalic of Acre. But the most of the interior, comprehending Jerusalem, Hebron, Nablous, Tiberias, and in fact the greater part of Palestine, are included in the pashalic of Damascus, which comprehends all the districts E. of the Jordan once possessed by the halftribe of Manasseh, and the tribes of Reuben and Gad. In its present political division the pasha of Acre has under him the whole of the mountainous territory of the Druses, and the coast of Southern Phoenicia, from the Nahar-el-Kelb south to Cape Blanco, the ancient Scala Tyriorum, and the Album Promontorium of Ptolemy. This latter portion was not included in the early Israelitish territory; but the mountainous tract bounding it on the S.E., now called the Druse territory, and the Bekaa or valley between the two Lebanons, as far N.W. as the point of junction of the two ranges, was given to them. From this N.W. point the boundary of the ancient Israelites ran S.W. along the summit of the eastern chain, or Antilibanus, to the point where it diverges into two ranges, including in this angle the upper valley and sources of the Jordan. From the head of the angle, the boundary ran along the summit of the S.E. range, called Mount Hermon, to its most southern point. From thence the eastern limit went alongst the western boundary of the Hauran, crossing in its way the range of Mount Gilead, and from thence S. over a hilly rugged region all the way to the river Arnon, the northern frontier of ancient Moab, whilst the territory of the ancient Ammonites lay to the E. of this line. This limit was included in the original grant, and is quite independent of the subsequent conquests of David; when under his son, the great Solomon, the eastern boundary was carried to the Euphrates, and the N. eastern to Hamath in Syria, on the Orontes, in 34° 45′ N. lat. It was then that the kingdom of Solomon reached from sea to sea, namely, from the Mediterranean sea to the Red sea, and from the river'-the Euphrates to the ends of the land, at the brook Sihor or torrent of El Arish, or, as it is expressed elsewhere, from Tiphsah or Thapsacus to Gaza. In this large sense it included the whole of the modern pashalic of Damascus, the Syrian desert, and the country of the Ammonites, Edomites, and Moabites, now included under Arabia. This extended dominion, however, was but temporary, and the possessions of the Israelites were soon reduced to their original limits. Having described the country

E. of the Jordan in our account of Damascus, we must here confine ourselves to the pashalic of Acre, and the country W. of the Jordan and the Dead sea. In this tract are comprehended Southern Phoenicia, the Drusian mountaineers, the two Galilees between the Mediterranean and the sea of Tiberias, the district of Nablous S. of the Galilees, Judea Proper, and the coast from Cape Blanco to El Arish. On inspecting the map, this tract is seen to be but a long narrow stripe of territory, extending from 31° to 34° N. lat., or 207 British miles alongst the coast; and no where above 50 British miles broad, from the sea to the Jordan, nor above 60 miles from the coast to the Dead sea. Even including the Transjordanic portion, its utmost breadth seldom exceeds 80 miles, and in the northern part not above 50 miles from Mount Hermon to the sea.

CHAP. II.-TOPOGRAPHY.

Topography.] As the limits of our work forbid us to enter into any minute description of the aspect, climate, and productions, of this interesting spot, which it would require a volume to delineate, we must content ourselves with giving a short outline of the various districts mentioned above, beginning with the coast S. of the Nahar Kelb.

PHOENICIA.] Bairoot, the ancient Berytus, is the first place of any consequence as we go to the S.W. It was once a celebrated place, and made a Roman colony by Augustus Cæsar. It became a celebrated seminary of lawyers in the latter period of the Roman empire, when it was as famous for the study of law in the East, as Rome in the West, and was styled by Justinian, that paragon of legislators, the mother and nurse of the law.' During the crusades it was taken and retaken, and suffered severely both from Christians and Saracens. In the 17th century it was the capital of Faker-el-deen, prince of the Druses, and the remains of his elegant palace and ornamented gardens still exist. It is the sea-port for the cotton and silks of the Druses, and is surrounded with mulberry-plantations, and orange and olive-groves. Bairoot is a fine healthy place, and contains about 10,000 souls, 3000 of whom are Turks, the rest Druses and Christians.

Saide.] S.W. of Bairoot is Saide, the ancient Sidon, the mother of the Phoenician commerce, and famed for its haven in the days of Jacob. It seems to have been the ancient capital of the Phoenicians before Tyre rose into importance. The immediate vicinity of Saide is a very pretty country, the plain at the foot of the hills, which is two miles wide, being filled with extensive and shady groves and gardens, with narrow lanes between them. The hills themselves are also fruitful. Saide is a larger town than Acre, the situation is good, and the air salubrious; and it contains a population of 15,000 souls, 2000 of whom are Maronites, 400 Jews, and the rest Turks.

Tyre.] Ten miles S.W. of Saide are the ruins of the ancient Sarepta, and 15 miles S.W. of this latter is Soor, the ancient Tyre, called by Joshua the strong city of Tzoor,' and the most celebrated of all the Phoenician cities. It seems to have been a colony from Sidon, and at a subsequent period to have eclipsed that city itself in commercial wealth and political importance, it being the greatest mart in the ancient world, and possessed of all the trade of the Mediterranean sea. So great was its naval power that it baffled the arms of the Assyrian conqueror Shalmanazar. It withstood the arms of Nebuchadnezzar for 13 years, and