344 Description of Minerals from Palestine. 
been transported from some other quarter, to the place where 
it was found. Judging from the other specimens, taken from 
different parts of the mountain, | conclude that the principal 
ingredient in the formation of this lofiy protuberance, so 
well known to the ancients, and so celebrated in scriptural 
poetry, is calcareous matter. This conclusion is corrobo- 
visited the summit of Libanus, and disco. ered that it ‘ con- 
sisted wholly of limestone, but it was chiefly primitive lime- 
stone.” He, however, informs us. that he observed one 
* fossil shell’? on the top of the mountain. 
n the autumn of 1823, Mr. Fisk, accompanied by Mr. 
Wolff, visited this lofty eminence ; on some parts of which 
the aw continues through the hot season, undissolved. In 
) » he found it pic Alpine. 1 will give you 
his own gs wage “ rst ascended a very steep moun- 
tain, and then Soke dea one of the steepest I ever attempted 
to pass. The road turns so often as nearly to double the 
distance, and yet it is almost impassable. We often crossed 
narrow ways, with a stupendous precipice above us of im- 
mense rocks, piled up almost perpendicularly, and a similar 
one below us.” In another place, he says, ‘at half past 
nine, we ‘efi Tripoli, rode over a plain, and ascended the 
mountains, till we reached a lofty summit, with a valley be- 
fore us, which I cannot better describe, than by calling it a 
frightful chasm in the earth. We dismounted, and descend- 
ed literally by winding oe nearly to the bottom of the ra- 
vine, and then, after various windings and gentle ascents 
among the shrub ah we reached the convent Antonius, 
situate on the side of an almost ruplin ular mountain.” 
Mount Lebanon, bleak, wild, and precipitous as it is, 
contains a large population. The number of Christians 
spread over it, is estimated at 100, or 150,000. who have, 
Mr. F. supposes, 100 convents on the mountain. 
‘The ancient ornaments of Lebanon—the cedars—in pro- 
curing which, for the building of the temple. and of other 
_ edifices, Solomon kept ten thousand men constantly employ- 
ed on the mountain, during a considerable period, have not 
: all porpeeres- Ove grove of them still remains. essts. 
and King examined them» « They are situate” not 
on the summit, but “at the foot of a high mountain, in what 
_ may considered as the arena of a vast amphitheatre, o Se 
~ ing to the W. with high mountains on the N.S. and E.. 
