234 TRANSACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS OF [Sess. lvi. 



were the produce of the oldest cedars now extant in the 

 ancient forest of Lebanon, and a sample of a quantity 

 gathered last season, and brought to this country with the 

 view of raising young plants from the seeds. It was 

 found, however, on examining them after their arrival that 

 they contained no fertile seeds, and we cannot look forward 

 to seeing, as the result of this direct importation, any cedars 

 which could be pointed to as the immediate descendants 

 of those venerable and interesting trees. The sterility of 

 the seeds in these cones may have arisen from various 

 causes, but it is to be hoped that the ancient trees are still 

 producing fertile seeds. The cones are very durable, and 

 if collected before they are over-ripe, they will keep for 

 many years in a perfect state, as is shown by a cone on 

 the table, which I gathered at Sprotborough Hall, in South 

 Yorkshire, in 1858, and it is still quite sound and perfect. 

 Ever since the days of the building of the Temple at 

 Jerusalem by King Solomon, the cedars of Lebanon have 

 been among the most famous trees in history. In more 

 recent times their numbers have become comparatively few 

 in the forest of Lebanon, and there is some danger of their 

 disappearing altogether from their native habitat at an 

 early period if they are not more carefully protected and 

 means devised by which they may reproduce themselves. 



Since the middle of the sixteenth century many travellers 

 have visited Mount Lebanon, and left on record the 

 number of the cedars they met with, and the condition in 

 whicli tliey found them. Tlie earlier travellers state that 

 upwards of two dozen of the ancient cedars existed about 

 1550, but Maundrell, who visited the forest in 1G96, found 

 only sixteen trees, which he described as being " very old 

 and of a prodigious bulk," while he said tliat " others 

 younger, and of a smaller size, are very numerous." When 

 Sir Joseph ]). Hooker visited Lebanon in 1800, he found 

 the cedars confined to a small and coni]>aratively level area 

 at the head of the Kadisha Valley, at an altitude of GOOO 

 feet, about foui' miles south of the summit of Mount 

 Lebanon, and lifleen miles eastward, as the crow flies, from 

 the Levant. Sir Joseph on his return gave a very interest- 

 ing and minute account of the cedars, whicli appeared in 

 the public prints, in which he said about four hundred trees. 



