CHAP. CXIII. CONl'FER*:. CE^DRUS. 24-07 



trees," he says, "are from 3ft. to 16ft. French, in circumference, and 

 their height exceeds 50ft. French. I suppose," he adds/, "that they owe 

 their preservation to their being situated on a mountain difficult of access, 

 and at a distance from towns where their wood could be used, and to which 

 from their present habitat, it could now be only transported on the backs 

 of animals." (Ann. Scien. Xat., 2. s., vol. i. p. 235.) The cedar has also been 

 lately discovered on Mount Atlas, whence cones, and specimens of the 

 branches, leaves, and wood, have been sent by Mr. Drummond Hay, the 

 British consul at Tangier, to Mr. Lambert ; and specimens have also been 

 received from Morocco by P. B. Webb, Esq. The probability is, that the 

 range of the tree not only extends over the whole of that group of moun- 

 tains which is situated between Damascus and Tripoli in Syria, and which 

 includes the Libanus and Mounts Amanus and Taurus of antiquity, and 

 various other mountains, but that its distribution on the mountainous re- 

 gions of the north of Africa is extensive ; though of the botany of these 

 latter regions scarcely anything is at present known. The ancient writers 

 who mention the cedar state that it had many different habitats; and 

 Theophrastus and Pliny make it a native of Egypt, Crete, Cyprus, &c. ; 

 but, as they included the junipers, and probably several other trees, under 

 the general name of Cedrus, no reliance can be placed on their testimony. 

 The cedar has been said by some authors, both Continental and British, 

 to be a native of Mounts Amanus and Taurus, and of Siberia ; but, though 

 the first statement is probably true, the second, as will hereafter be shown, 

 is decidedly erroneous. Loiseleur Deslongchamps in the Nouveau Du 

 Hamel, and Baudrillart in the Dictionnaire des Eaux et Forets, inform us 

 that Belon found the cedar growing on Mount Amanus and Mount Taurus ; 

 and that Pallas states, in his Observations faites dans un Voyage, &c., that 

 he found it in the countries between the Wolga and the Tobol, in Siberia, 

 and on the Altaic Mountains, Baudrillart adding that he had been informed 

 by a Russian officer in the administration of the forests, that the wood of the 

 cedars found in Siberia was so soft and so brittle, as to be unfit for the con- 

 struction of ships. Mr. Lambert also quotes Pallas, to prove that the cedar, 

 in Siberia, does not thrive so well in dry as in moist ground. 



Belon, who wrote about 1550, mentions the cedar among the " singulari- 

 ties " observed by him during his travels in the East (see Les Observ., &c., 

 p. 162. 166.) ; and states that it grows not only on Mount Libanus, "on which 

 some remain even to this day, planted, as it is thought, by Solomon himself; " 

 but also " on the mountains Taurus and Amanus, in cold stony places." 

 He adds that the merchants of the factory of Tripoli, in Syria, told him 

 that " the cedar grew on the declivity of Mount Lebanon next that city, 

 and that the inhabitants of Syria made boats of it, for want of the pine 

 tree." In Belon's treatise, De Arboribus Coniferis, published in 1553, the 

 author says he was told that the cedar of Solomon is found on Mount Le- 

 banon, and also on Amanus and Taurus, and on the mountains above Nicea ; 

 but nowhere in the Isle of Crete. He then mentions several kinds of juniper, 

 all of which he calls cedars ; and states it to be his opinion, that the great 

 cedar of Mount Lebanon was not the wood used for building Solomon's 

 temple, (p. iv.) In another page, after relating his visit to Mount Lebanon, 

 he says, " Right true and excellent are the trees of Mount Lebanon." He 

 afterwards describes their appearance and mode of growth, adding: " The cedars 

 that we saw on Amanus and Taurus were very similar to these. They grow in 

 moist places, like those in which the spruce fir (picea, Ambles L.) delights ; and 

 they are also found in moist valleys : Cedros quas in Amano et Tauro vidi- 

 mus, eandem cum praedictis habere similitudinem comperimus. In humidis nati 

 quemadmodum picea, oblectatur, atque etiam convalles humorem habentes 

 sequL" He adds that these trees grow somewhat like the silver fir (abies, 

 Picea I/.), but have a portion of the trunk smooth (glabro), and unclothed. It 

 is very probable, the trees found by Belon on Mounts Amanus and Taurus 

 were not cedars of Lebanon, but the Pmus Cembra. With regard to the 

 assertion, that Pallas found the cedar in Siberia, M. Delamarre, in his 



