Page:Syria, the land of Lebanon (1914).djvu/22

Rh mystic alpenglow on the snow-clad peaks of Switzerland and the delicate opalescence of the Isles of Greece; but I have never seen — I never expect to see — another glory of earth which can compare with the wondrous coloring of the mountains of Lebanon. We watched floods of red and orange sweep across the lofty summits and then brighten into crowns of mellow gold. We looked into gorges tinged with a purple so rich and deep that the color itself seemed almost a tangible thing. Nearer still we drew, and at the foot of the mountains there came into view dark forests of evergreen and broad, sloping orchards set here and there with tiny villages of shining white. Then there appeared long lines of silvery surf and yellow sand; and we skirted the northern edge of a rock-bound promontory to the crowded harbor of Beirut.

The wording of the Old Testament might lead one to infer that Lebanon is a single mountain, and the modern Syrians also familiarly refer to it as ej-Jebel — "The Mountain." It is not, however, an isolated peak, but an entire range, which begins at the northern border of Palestine and stretches for a hundred miles along the easternmost shore of the Mediterranean. The narrow coastal plain cannot be distinguished at a distance. Straight out of the water the thousand summits rise in ever loftier ranks [ 2 ]