Description of Minerals from Palestine. 345 
cedars stand on five or six gentle elevations, and occupy a 
spot of ground, which I walked around in 15 minutes. We 
measured a number of trees. ‘The largest is upwards of 40 
feet in cireumference.” Several others they found of nearly 
ual girth. “The height of some of the tallest is 90 feet. 
The entire number of cedars, and these are all which are to 
be seen on the mountains, according to Mr. King, is 321. 
“ They produce a conical fruit, in shape and size, like that 
of the pine”? Of this fruit, and also of the chips of the 
cedar, Mr. Fisk has had be goodness to transmit to mea 
number of specimens.. The cones are about three inches 
long, and one. inch and a half in their transverse diameter, 
are much more compact than any fruit of a similar kind in 
New England. | 
28. * From a wall at the place where it is said that Abra- 
ham received and entertained the angels. The wail is com- 
posed of very large stones, some of them 10 feet long, and I 
think 3 or 4 feet high, all apparently of the same. kind with 
this sample.” This is a very singular substance. It ap- 
pears to be a kind of calcareous Breccia, in whose composi- 
tion is infused a smail proportion of magnesia. Hs exterior 
surface is pale red, interspersed with spots of gray. ,It is 
unctuous to the touch. It is composed. in part, of rounded 
by him, and, when he saw them, he ran to meet them from 
the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground, and 
said, my Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass 
not away, I pray thee, from thy servant: let a little water 
I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest your- 
selves under the tree. ‘Near Hebron,” says Caimet, 
“ stood the oak, or turpentine tree, under which Abraham 
received the three angels.”” This tree, Solomon affirms 
thoughehardly credible, was standing in the fourth century, 
highly honoured "y pilgrimages and annua! feasts, 
ot far from this spot, was the “ field,” which Abraham _ 
boug t of Ephron the Hittite,—(the earliest purchase of — 
Vou. 1X.--No. 2. 44 
