320 TREES. 



not like his boughs, nor the chestnut-trees like his branches, nor any 

 tree in the garden^ of God like unto him in beauty." 



The original forests of this tree upon Mount Lebanon, must haye 

 been tril'ly yast, as Solomon's "forty thousand hewer&l' were .em- 

 ployed there in cutting the timber used in building the temple. ■ It 

 is indeed most prolsable that they never recovered or were renewed 

 afterwards, since modern travellers give accounts of their ; gradual 

 disappear'ance. . Such, however, is the great age and longevity of 

 this tree, that it is higlily credible that the few existing old specimens 

 on Mount Lebanon, are remnants of the ancient forest. Lamartine, 

 who made a voyage to , the Holy Land, and visited these trees in 

 183^, gives the following account of them : , 



"We alighted and sat down tmder a rock to contemplate them." 

 These trees are the most renovraed natural monuments in the unir 

 verse; religion, poetry, and .histOiy, have all equally celebrated 

 them. The Arabs of all sects entertain a, traditional veneration for 

 these trees. They attribute to them not only a vegetative power, 

 which enables thena to live eternally, but also an intelligence, which 

 causes them to manifest signs of wisdoni and foreaght, similar to 

 liiose of instinct and reason. in man. They are said to understand 

 the changes of seasons; they stir their vast branches as if they were 

 limbs ;■ they spread out and contract their, boughs, inclining them 

 towards heaven, or towards earth, aocorddng as the snow ^^fepar^ to 

 fall o* to melti Thes'e trees diminish in eVery. succeeding age. 

 Travellers formerly CiOijin ted 30 or 40 ; more recently 11; morere- 

 cently^stiU only 12; there are. now but 1'.' These, however, ^from 

 their size and general appearance, may be fairly presumed to have, 

 existed ih biblical times. Around these ancient witnesses of ages 

 long since past, there still remains a grove of yellower cedara,? ap- 

 pearing to me to form a group of 400 or 500 trees or shrubs. Every 

 year, in the month of June, the inhabitants of Be^chieria, of Eden, of 

 Kanobin, and the other neighboring valleys and villages, clamber. up 

 to these cedars, and celebrate mass at their feet. How many pray- 

 ers have i;esounded under these, brahehes ; and what more ' beautiful 

 canopy for woi-ship can exist ! " ' ' 



The trunks of the largest of these venerable trfees measure from 

 30 to 40 feet in circumference. The finest and most numerous 



