Page:Syria, the land of Lebanon (1914).djvu/209

THE CEDARS OF THE LORD delicious grapes, tomatoes, fresh milk, and new-laid eggs at six cents a dozen.

After dinner a young Maronite priest came up from the convent to visit us. Father Abdullah proved to be the private secretary of the patriarch, who has a summer residence at Diman. It was an unanticipated experience for us to meet, high up in this wild mountain region, a Syrian priest who, after graduating from the Maronite College at Beirut, had spent seven years in advanced Latin studies at Paris and had then read archæology at the British Museum. Father Abdullah's English, however, was a broken reed; so most of our conversation was carried on in French, with an occasional lapse into Arabic. He said that his long residence at Paris had naturally brought him into closest sympathy with the French, but that nevertheless he considered the English superior in practicality and energy. He had recently made an independent archæological study of the surrounding district, and entertained us by telling some of his own theories concerning the very early history of Lebanon. Later in the evening, as a further evidence of his friendship, he sent us a great basket of fresh figs.

While we were enjoying this delicious gift, the fog rolled up again from the west and filled the gorge until we looked across the billowing surface of a milk-white sea, above which only a few of the loftiest peaks appeared as lonely islands. Such was the  [ 165 ]