THE CEDARS OF LEBANON. 129 



bear for strength and durability. This result is 

 doubtless owing to the manner in which the trees are 

 raised in this country, where everything is done to 

 induce rapid growth, being naturally a slow-growing 

 tree, extracting its nourishment from hard and cal- 

 careous formations, upon mountains of great elevation, 

 while from the treatment they receive here they 

 partake more of the nature of exotics than the hardy 

 trees they are. It is a common practice in nurseries 

 to sow the seeds in heat under glass, and pot off the 

 young plants in June, when their cotyledons only are 

 full grown, while others remove the plants when a 

 year old into pots, and change them into larger ones 

 as their growth advances. 



It was in the keen biting air, after centuries 

 of exposure, that the cedar trees of biblical and 

 classical history perfected themselves ; the continued 

 howlings of the storms, which appear to have their 

 birthplace in the mountains of Syria, giving rise to the 

 description of " the violence of Lebanon," one of the 

 most forcible illustrations which are used in the Bible. 



The summit of Lebanon being nearly 10,000 feet 

 high, many of the loftiest peaks are covered with snow, 

 and it has been pointed out that the prophet Ezekiel, 

 evidently a close observer of nature, had doubtless 

 noticed that the trees were sustained by the melting 

 snows in hot weather, and rose to a height and 

 magnificence not attained by others differently 

 situated, when he says : " Thus was he fair in his 

 greatness, in the length of his branches, for his roots 

 were by the great waters ;" it being at the bottom of 

 the highest peaks, at an altitude of nearly 8,000 feet, 

 that the cedars are found. 



K 



