is perceived. I had long been of opinion that
no person who has not visited Lebanon—I care
not in what other part of the world he may have
wandered—can know what beauties are to be
met with in a landscape of which the eye can at
one and the same time take in all the details;
but I am equally sure that no one who has not
seen the view from the drawing-room window of
Mr. S.'s house in Shemlin can fully appreciate
the wonderful beauty of the views in Mount
Lebanon.

After a very pleasant sojourn of nearly twenty-
four hours in the American Protestant seminary
at Abeigh, we started for another American
missionary station, that of Deir-el-Kamar. Deir-el-
Kamar is generally styled the capital of Lebanon,
although some natives of the country contend
that the title should be given to Zahlie. The
population of Deir-el-Kamar amounts to about five
thousand souls, and is composed of Druses, Jews,
and Christians, the latter being subdivided into
Maronites, Greek Catholics, and—recently—
Protestants. Ten years ago, an American
missionary, named Dr. Eli Smith, was stoned and
driven away from this town by an especial order
of the Maronite bishop. The alarm caused by
the violence of the priests had an effect upon
Mrs. Smith that caused her death. Matters are,
however, very much changed for the better now.
The clergy still continue to hurl their anathemas
against all who have anything to do with the
heretics' school, teaching, or books, and even
forbid their flocks to visit, or sell bread to, the
missionary house. But in Lebanon, as elsewhere,
the days of bigotry are fast passing away, and
during our sojourn of two days with the present
missionary more than twenty or thirty of the
leading men in the place came to visit him,
whilst each evening he had a regular levee of
men—his wife having one of women, apart—who
came to ask him questions, and receive such
instruction as can be conveyed by conversation,
upon religion, science, politics, history, and such
other subjects as came uppermost in their heads.

My companion, who spoke Arabic perfectly,
undertook to examine both schools, without
giving any notice to the masters; and, by selecting
himself the books on which to question them.
The questions I dictated in English, and the
answers were translated to me, and I have no
hesitation in saying that, in biblical knowledge,
geography, arithmetic, geometry, and history,
the replies given would have done honour to any
lads of their age in England.

From Deir-el-Kamar we proceeded to the
palace of Btedin, on the opposite side of the
valley, and on our road to Muctava. Btedin
was the residence and seat of government of the
late Emir-Bechir-Shehab, who ruled over the
whole of Lebanon for nearly half a century,
until deprived of his power by the English in
1840, when we took Syria from the Egyptians,
and restored the country to the Turks. At
present the immense range of buildings—
considerably larger than the palace of St. James's
—is, and has been for some years, rented by the
Turkish authorities, who use it as a barrack for
the only soldiers—about two hundred in number
—who are stationed in Lebanon. For upwards
of forty years the late Emir spared neither
trouble nor expense in making his palace one of
the most magnificent residences in the East—
perhaps in the whole world. The marble courts
and marble pillars were erected under the eyes
of the best sculptors Italy could produce; there
were numerous large Turkish baths—finer than
any I have seen in Constantinople—beautiful
fountains, and a magnificent Maronite chapel.
The mosaic work alone, covering the entire roof
and walls of several of the courts, must have
cost many thousand pounds. In the days of the
Emir, two thousand five hundred persons—
including servants, horsemen, followers, priests,
strangers, guests, and others—slept every night
within the walls of Btedin. At present,
although the garrison of Turkish soldiers is only
three hundred strong, one third of the number
have to be lodged at Deir-el-Kamar, as there are
not, in the whole immense palace, a sufficient
number of rooms in habitable repair for the
accommodation of more men. When we visited
the palace we found the three Turkish officers
who command the troops crowded into one small
room, of about fourteen feet by ten. They told
us that during rainy weather there was not
another dry place in the entire palace. The
stables, in the days of the Emir, held one
thousand horses, besides five hundred camels and
other baggage animals; at present it was with
great difficulty that shelter could be found for
two out of the five horses which belonged to our
party and the servants. And yet the Turkish
authorities have only had the castle ten years in
their hands, it having been made over to them
in excellent repair. The Turks never attend to
repairs, and at Btedin they have allowed their
soldiers to break and carry off whatever they
pleased of the magnificent ornaments in marble
and mosaic which adorned the place. I
particularly noticed a magnificent solid bronze gate,
which must have cost several thousand pounds
when new. The metal upon it had been cut and
hacked away with axes, until barely a vestige of
the original form was left. So it is, also, with
the fountains, which not many years ago were the
wonder of Syria, and to supply which water had
been brought, at an immense expense, from a
very long way off in the hills. At present there
is not one of them which is not choked and
broken, the water being allowed to run to waste
all over the immense court and—once—beautiful
gardens of the palace. The gardens, too, are
completely overrun with weeds; the trees and
shrubs, which had been collected from the four
quarters of the world, are withering or dead.

Leaving Btedin about twelve o'clock, we
crossed another ridge of the mountain, and were
now fairly in the country of the Druses. The
Druses of Lebanon are a much finer and more
independent race of men than the Christian
inhabitants of the mountain. Their feudal
aristocracy consists of two families of emirs, or
princes, and five of sheiks, or chiefs. The whole
Druse population in Lebanon contains from