Page:Syria, the land of Lebanon (1914).djvu/231

THE CEDARS OF THE LORD could sit together. Then there is the Guardian, oldest and largest of all, its great trunk twisted and gnarled by struggles against the storms of ages, the names which famous travelers carved a century ago not yet covered by its slowly growing bark. But the knotted, wrinkled, lightning-scarred giant is crowned by a garland of evergreen, and the venerable tree, which perhaps heard the sound of Hiram's axemen, may still be standing proudly erect when the achievements of our own century are dimmed in the ancient past.

"The Cedars of the Lord"—we understand now why the peasantry of Lebanon call them thus. It has become our own name for them too. Long before we ride downward from their royal solitude to the Great Sea and the great busy world, we have come to think of them as in deed and truth,

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