IV, 
136 THE HOLY LAND. 
CHAR certainly offer their highest adoration to a calf\ 
This account of their religion we received from 
a sensible and well-informed member of their 
own community. The worship of the calf may 
be accounted for, in their Egjjptian origin ^ ; the 
remains of superstition, equally antient, being 
still retained in that country. Although the 
vicinity of Mount Libanus may be considered 
as the residence of the main horde of this 
people, stragglers, and detached parties of 
them, may be found in every part of the Holy 
Land. The inhabitants of Sephoury are gene- 
rally Alaronites^; yet even here we found some 
(1) The worship of the Ca^has been doubted, and by some denied ; 
but the existence of this curious relic of the antient mytholog'y of 
Esypt, as well as of the worship of Venus, among the inhabitants of 
Mount Libanus, is now placed beyond dispute. Colonel Capper, jour- 
neying, overland, from India to Cyprus, in order to join our fleet in 
the Mediterranean, informed the author that he had witnessed the 
existence of the last-mentioned superstition. 
(£) See a Note in the preceding Chapter, p. 90. 
(3) A very curious account of the Maronite Cliristinns, collected 
from their own historians, is given by De la Roque {Voyage en Syrie 
et du Mont Liban, Par. 1722.) wherein it is stated, that this sect were 
named from their founder, St. Maron, a Syrian hermit, who lived 
about the beginning of the fifth century, and whose life is written bj' 
Tlieodnret. His austere mode of living spread his reputation all over 
the East. St. Chrysostom wrote a letter to him from tlie place of his 
exile, (" Ad Maronem Monachum et Presbyterum Epist.' S. Joan. 
Chrysost, 36.") which letter fixes very nearly the time when St. Maron 
lived, which was about the year of Christ 400. Pocoche says {Descript. 
of the Ea«t, vol. II. p. 94.) that the Maronites are esteemed more honest 
than any other sect of Christians in the Ea^t. 
