tions rather than his discoveries there, what he learned at Beyrout, rather than what he saw on the hills. Silk Buckingham parades his adventures in the Lebanon with the usual admixture of profound disquisition, which readers skip; while they will do well also to make large allowances for the imaginary facts of that modest writer. Burckhard is learned, accurate, and thorough, — capital in copying inscriptions, measuring ruins, recording names and places, estimating distances, and the like, but is rather dry to a general reader. Volney's book, translated nearly seventy years ago, remains still, in spite of its inaccuracies, the most instructive and entertaining account of the Lebanon in the English tongue. The German travellers have treated more of the geography of the region than of its history, its commerce, or its religions.

The author of the work before us writes, not as a mere traveller across the Lebanon ranges, but as one long resident there. Among the illustrations which adorn his volumes is a picture of his own mansion at Howarra. The motives of his ten years' sojourn among these mountain-tribes he does not tell us, and we learn nothing more about him in the body of the work than is contained in the title-page, and in the dedication where he speaks of himself as the "faithful and obliged friend" of the Duke of Wellington. That he is a man of thorough education and refined taste, the style of his writings sufficiently proves. Disclaiming the credit of an historian, he has produced a work which has the order, the substance, and the value of a history, with the freshness of a novel. His scanty and unmanageable materials are arranged with singular skill, and each volume of the series preserves its own unity. The ulterior object of Colonel Churchill in publishing such a work is patriotic. He wishes England to be aware of the value of this Syrian territory, that, when the Turkish empire is dismembered and the Turkish power overthrown, as it must speedily be, England may avail herself of her growing popularity in the East to assume the protectorate, if not the ownership, of the Lebanon. He urges this for military as well as for commercial reasons. "Lebanon is the great natural fortress which stands midway between the Eastern and the Western world." Nor does he omit the still higher

philanthropic and religious plea; but eloquently prophesies that the English occupation of the mountains and the commercial intercourse resulting from it will "draw together and unite the hitherto divergent races of mankind in the humanizing relations of fraternity and peace."

The glowing description which Colonel Churchill gives of the natural scenery of the Lebanon is not exaggerated. It is the union of Alpine grandeur with Oriental beauty. There is all the wildness of a mountain region with all the richness which poets ascribe to the gardens of Arabia. The highest peaks are crowned with perpetual snow. Beneath the long white line, which for half the year lies dazzling under an evershining sun, vast ledges and bald crags belt the hills with a grayer girdle. Below these are forests of fir and oak, the hiding-place of wolves and jackals, and, according to the natives, of tigers and hyenas; but it is fair to say that the last-named animals are rarely seen, and more rarely killed. In the gorges, the black volcanic rocks contrast finely with the silver threads of innumerable brooks and cascades, and the green, in various shades, of the orchards of fig and mulberry and olive. In the higher portions of the mountain, the sides of the hills are extremely steep, and the pathways are but zigzag steps along the precipice. Lower down, the slopes are more gradual, fair pastures appear, and there are valleys of exuberant fertility, where tropical plants grow almost spontaneously, and where the increase of the earth is amazingly swift and redundant. The vegetables and fruits of the East and West are here brought close together, the orange ripens by the side of the apple, the pomegranate blooms above the potato, and the coffee-berry and the tobacco-leaf are joined in their culture, as they combine in their subsequent use to perfect the bliss of the homes of the land.

In vineyards, the sides of Lebanon rival the terraced slopes of the Pyrenees and the Rhine-land. Less labor is required in their training, and the vines grow even more luxuriantly. Sometimes they are appended as a graceful ornament to the mulberry-orchards, and grapes are gathered from the same bending branches which have already furnished the silk-worms with their food. Oftener they cover the swelling cone of

some low hill, weaving with their matted tendrils over the whole surface a fantastic embroidery. If the clusters of Lebanon do not reach in magnitude the reported dimensions of the clusters of Eshcol, which would burden two men with their weight, the fame of their juice is as wide, and its flavor is as delicious to travellers who have been dosed with the bitter acids that bear in Judæa the name of wine. The wine of Lebanon has to-day a flavor which justifies the symbolic description of its fragrance by the old prophet Hosea.* If it be not now the sign of a renewed people, it restores a traveller's nearly exhausted faith in the virtues of the generous vine.

It is difficult to determine, in the landscapes of the Lebanon, which is most prominent, the work of nature or of man. The industry of ages has to such a degree corrected the irregular forms and developed the latent capacities of these hills, that the art upon them is quite as striking as the rugged features which no culture can change. In their whole length they are densely peopled,-more densely, it is probable, than any other mountain region on the face of the earth, and, according to their proportion of arable land, more densely than any other region whatever. The proper extent of the Lebanon is not more than one hundred miles from north to south, and, if the Antilibanus be excluded, not more than thirty in its greatest breadth. Above the latitude of Tripoli, its summits fall away, rising again some hundred miles farther north, where they approach and mingle with the ranges of Mount Taurus. The district technically called "the Lebanon" lies between the summits of Mount Turbul on the north and Mount Reehan on the south, the Bekaa or Cale-Syria on the east and the Mediterranean on the west. A little beyond its southern extremity, the Leontes empties into the sea near Tyre, and at no great distance from its northern frontier its traffic reaches the Orontes and the decayed city of Antioch. It includes a considerable portion of ancient Phoenicia, and its principal marts are those which were important in King Hiram's reign, three thousand years ago. Sidon, with a scarcely changed name, remains a port of entry and departure for the traffic of

the mountains; and many of the same wares which once stocked the markets of the ancient Berytus are still to be seen in the bazaars of modern Beyrout. In the northern portion of the region the peaks are highest, attaining an elevation of nearly ten thousand feet above the sea. The loftiest peaks of the Antilibanus, which bound on the eastern side the valley of Cole-Syria, are not more than six thousand feet above the sea. The same physical character belongs to this opposite mountain range which belongs to the Lebanon. A history, too, of one range is in substance a history of the other. The eastern hills have shared the political fortunes of the western.

The exact number of inhabitants of the Lebanon it is very difficult to reckon, or even to estimate. The villages are so numerous, the method of living so patriarchal, and the jealousy of Frank intrusion so quick and sensitive, that, even if a foreigner could find his way through the intricate passages of the mountains, he would gain but little correct information from the natives. The Turkish authorities at Sidon, Beyrout, and Tripoli are unable to tell the population of the region which pays them tribute. Their dealings are with the Sheiks and Emirs, not directly with the inhabitants. Estimating the average number of each of the twenty-one districts at about twenty thousand, the whole population of the Lebanon may be reckoned at somewhat more than four hundred thousand. Of these the Maronites are most numerous, making about one half of the whole. The Druses, nearly equal in political and military importance, are far inferior in numbers. In the Lebanon proper, their communities do not exceed thirty thousand souls, and in all Syria they are not more than sixty thousand. There are in the low lands on the borders of the Bekaa and the sea some thirty thousand Moslems, and the remainder of the people are chiefly Greek Catholics, with a few of the Orthodox Greek Church. The Maronites are found throughout the whole length of the range, but have exclusive possession of the northern districts, especially the region back of Tripoli and Djebail. The Druses are the hereditary owners of the southern districts. Their principal towns are on the hills between the latitudes of Sidon and Beyrout. The Greek Christians, who are, however, mostly

Syrians in language and descent, are found in the larger trading cities, especially those on the roads from Damascus to the Mediterranean.

We shall not attempt to follow Colonel Churchill in his comprehensive account of these twenty-one districts, to pronounce the names of which correctly is no small trial to English vocal organs. Most of them are interesting, if not for their commercial or religious importance, at least for some historical association, remarkable adventure, or distinguished person connected with them. In the Jibby Bisherry, the loftiest, wildest, and most secluded of all the districts, the Maronites have their cities of refuge and their most sacred shrine. This is the convent of Kanobin, situated deep down in the gorge of one of the mountain torrents, in a hollow so dark that only the midday sun is able to reach it. Like the convents of the Nile and of St. Saba in Judæa, it is hewn partly from the solid rock. Dating back to the time of Theodosius, it owes its first important endowment to the Sultan Saladin, who here received food and shelter from the hospitable brethren. For several hundred years, it was the summer retreat of the Maronite patriarchs, who could remember how these strong chambers had received and protected one of their own sacred line, flying for his life. Legends of cruelty belong to the convent of Kanobin, which are fit to be classed with the stories of Inquisition tortures. The fate of Assaad Shidiak, who ventured to read for himself the Bible, to preach openly its doctrines, and even to argue from its pages against the orthodox views of the Maronite Church, is a warning to all heretics not to trust the kind words, or heed the invitation, of the brethren of this convent.

The district of Djebail was renowned in ancient times for its temple of Venus, where human sacrifices reddened the waters. It is known now all over the East for its fragrant tobacco, prized above all other varieties of the delicious weed. In the Arab degrees of comparison the Nile leaf is good, "Latakia" is better, but "Jebelee" is superlatively best, to be smoked only in a bowl of generous size, and through an amber mouthpiece. In this district, too, there is a fine illustration of the democratic spirit of the age, which is lifting