The Lebanon (Mount Souria) ; a history and a diary

Chapter I. Maronite Convents

The day havingsuddenly brightened, I had time to reach Emir Hydar's residence, and rejoiced to quit the den where I had been confined in darkness and smoke, though not sorry to have gone through it. I had begun to appreciate vividly the inconvenience of winter travelling in the Lebanon ; but so soon as I had emerg-ed into the open air, and looked around on the prospect, the sun glistening* on the snowy crests, and on the green tops of the pines, and penetrating to the red earth from which they grew, or rather seemed to stretch themselves, I ao-ain forgot the toil and inconveniences, and applauded my resolution ; for such fresh sweet air, such brio-ht colours, no other season could produce. We found the population scattered through the thin pine forests, gathering wood and digging* out roots.

I eyed them now with a haberdasher's eye, and scrutinized each Meintan and Jeleck, knowing the value of each piece of stuff. I found that I II. b had, as reo-ards the women at least, underrated their costume ; the groups were charmingamid the mix ture of green and red, furnished by the shade above and the soil beneath. We ascended a flat ridge about the width of the esplanade leadingto Edinburgh Castle, with the precipitous sides fallingaway to a depth of one or two thousand feet ; the crests, sweeping round, formed amphitheatres which everywhere exhibited entire geological sections. Here and there were stairs of terraces, patches and levels of the pictu resque pines, and in all directions, willows ; on the cliffs, in the vales, or among the precipices. The volcanic matter I had hitherto observed only cropp ing* out under the limestone, here it lay on the top of the limestone ; the dividing line stretched, as the horizon itself, level and imperturbable for miles in every direction ; being a stratum upset, which in the explosion had fallen back, and lay reversed, forming the highest parts.

This line, dividing* the brown or yellow crumbling mass from the hard cracked grey of the calcareous strata, was coarse ; cut. out into all the fantastic figures which the rocks and hills had assumed by the wearing of the water, and served to exhibit their sinuosities ; there was a region of yellow, and a region of grey ; and, as the eye descended from the one to the other, it had to readjust itself as if to a different focus. The lower part, not only by the colour, but also by its bold rocks and cliffs, might have been taken for the place of a sea suddenly let out; which had left its wild and naked bed as a contrast to the clothed, soft, and purple earth ; or as if two kinds of glasses were employed to let in the rays of the sun. Again might it suggest the contrast of winter and summer; the grey rocks being the glaciers.

In the bend of the amphitheatre which opened to the right, and on the sandstone part, stood a large and scattered village. The houses were of rich yellow; arcades and verandahs predominated in the architecture ; it, looked like a toy, so pretty and so strange was it. Our road now lay to the left, but I could not be so soon done with this place, so I determined to visit the villap-e of Sourie ; as the convent of Mir Hanna lay in the vale below, on the side of the hill I was upon, I turned back to commence with it. The land cast about its awkward, wry splitting blocks, as if in rivalry of the stately mathematical figures of the limestone. However, by the aid of a stair, rather than a road, in short zig-zags, we did get down, helped along* by the torrent from the recent rains, which, like ourselves, found this passage the easiest ; I need not say, recent rains, for we were at the moment under a heavy fall ; and the clouds had closed in and descended so that we could not see fifty 3'ards. ■ As soon as we got on the limestone, and that was a little above the convent, I saw, rendered more gigantic through the mist, a sarcophagus on a basement of rock, in the middle of a vineyard.

The top lay b under it unbroken, as if just heaved off. This top was very pointed ; and when complete, it could not have stood less than nine feet in height, by as many in length, and five in width. Under it, and at its foot, was another last resting place, hollowed in the rock, from which the lid had been removed. These sarcophagi, scattered all over the country, bear no lines or tracings of any kind, nor are any cotempo raneous chisellings to be found ; it was, therefore, with great satisfaction that I observed close by, set up in the vine}-ard wall, a mass of carved stone, evidently of a similar character and age : it was five feet broad, and standing seven feet out of the ground ; so it could not be less than ten long- : it had two longitudinal hollows, but what its purpose was, I could not devise.

The monastery is well built, with some show of ornament, in the mixture of the stones from the two regions, on the confines of which it is placed : the windows and doors were red ; the walls of yellow sandstone, which appeared quite as durable as the limestone. Inside there were low, dark arched corri dors; the windows shewed little glass, and were barricaded against the weather with hoards and clothes ; I should have called it mean and uncom fortable had not the experience of the last few days taught me the value, on any terms, of openings, glazed or not. The Abbot was ill in bed ; but his place was filled by a far more intelligent person, of engaging manners and easy conversation. The rest of the fraternity were kind, lively, and much rejoiced at this interruption of the monotony of their life : further than this I have nothing to say ; as there was not a shadow of any kind of instruction, and no trace of any peculiar character, habits, or costume.

They had not however derogated in manners, which prevented their good-nature and kindness from degenerating into vulgarity. I was shewn everything in the monastery by its whole inhabitants; the church, which was only 120 years old ; a chapel, of date unknown, but with no signs of antiquity ; a cellar, where the jars stood together like the amphoræ of old ; a printingoffice, a subject of great pride and little profit ; a refector}-, where human bones were suspended over tables which bore no one's flesh ; the old Abbot in his bed, for whom I prescribed, much to his satisfaction and little to my own ; and finally, the chamber prepared for my reception, where I was told I was to stay a month, as they would pray for rain every day during that time. This was fastingtime, and I had asked to be permitted to share their refectory meal ; they decided otherwise ; and a very well garnished tray was brought to my apartment, where the whole of the brotherhood assembled to see how I liked it.

By this time we had become fast friends, and the arrack with the seed of the pine to dispel its taste, was put in circulation ; though but slenderly partaken of by the fathers. It was with difficulty the supper was introduced, for every square foot of the floor had its occupant ; and I had to undergo the critical inspection of the whole community in disposing of bourgoul with marcook, and fowl with nature's knife and fork. This manner of eatingwas commented on, as a sign of very great humility. This time however I was dispensed from having to reply ; for the Abbot's deputy rebuked the speaker for inferring that any one should be humble by reason of eating* in the same manner as Abraham and Moses. They next treated me to a song, which Avas no other than a psalm sung" in Greek, the words beginning Eiraivirs rbv eiov ; and sung in the Greek style by all the lungs, with a bursting neck and a red face : the whole party joined in the chorusses.

It was short, and only carried me through two of the four dishes before me ; they then hoped they did not disturb me, when I thought that the}* need not have asked the question. After a very amusing evening, I retired to rest ; and made up for three sleepless nights, to awaken to a sunrise that denied the prayer of the monks, and invited me forth to walk the world again, beginningwith the beautiful villag-e of Sourie. But before I proceed, I have something to say of this monaster}'. I had just entered the Maronite country; a race which has a distinct existence, solely by reason of its belief, and whose belief is nevertheless the common one of the Catholic world. This was the first monastery I had been in ; it was also, as I was told, the largest and most ancient. I had to look in these institutions for the source of this life, and I found this one, politically aud reli giously, a nullity.

As I approached, it had occurred to me that these institutions offered the means which I was casting about to find, to invigorate the domestic industry of the people, or rather to arrest the decay of even so much as they still possess. The subject introduced itself, by one of the brothers brino-ingin a sock which he was knittingand in a manner which I had not before seen ; he used fine brass knitting needles, each made into a crotchet at one end, and he took the loop off the other needle with the crotchet, as we do off the fing-er. He worked expeditious!}', and said he had begun the pair that morning, and expected to finish them by to morrow night. This is now all they make at home ; their black caps, till recently, were knitted in like manner, and dyed by themselves ; now they buy Turkish caps, and put them on a mould to give them the shape, and dye them.

On inquiring the reason of this chanp-e, the acting- Abbot answered "idleness." The whole subject was now opened ; the}' said that formerly they used to have wool and cotton brought by the peasantry, and made their own clothes. Now these are not brought, and consequently they had to dress in the American cotton dyed blue, like the peasantry. I was able to tell them that the peasan tr}' would now be very glad to bring cotton and wool, but that they (the monks) preferred piastres. Again it was confessed that the cause of the change wa3 " idleness." They theji complained of the great poverty of the people, and their further impoverish ment by their buying everything from America and England ; to which countries they sent nothing* in return. I, on the other hand, explained their poverty by their idleness ; and suggested for them the field of useful enterprize, to which I have above referred.

They all acknowledged the evil, but the idea of meetingit had not arisen in one of their minds, nor could be made to enter. They were dead flounders, and could only float with the stream ; nevertheless, the chief spoke with great energy on the subject, and gave utterance to gloomy fore bodings. He had seen the condition of the people gradually sinking for twenty years, and now, with nothing to fear from chiefs, and no oppressions to complain of from government, he saw them becom ing poorer and poorer, idler and more idle ; yet with all this, he could not face the idea of doing anything* to stop it, and could only suggest, filling up the ports of Beyrout and Saida. " When we had no trade," he said, " we were rich ; now we have much trade and are poor." I told him that what he desired for the Lebanon, I desired for England ; that she too, when she had no commerce, was well clothed and well fed, and that the coming in of theirgold was to her a much greater loss, than the going forth of it was to them.

Several times the personages at Beyrout, now raised from Consuls to Ambassadors, (Elchi) were introduced. I had succeeded in stopping such con versatien, or in giving to it the go-bye. It was only the following morning that they gained their wish ; which I let them have, by asking them what made them so anxious about the Consuls, and what they expected or feared from them. The answer was, " We owe to the Consuls our not paying charatch, nor duties on the articles of our own consumption ; and in all litigations we have the benefit of the presence of the dragoman of the French Consul." When I put it to them, that this regarded a former state, when the French alone protected the Catholic priesthood, and that their freedom from charatch was a concession of their sovereign ; to which they agreed ; they then said, that when they now went to the French Consul, and the Druze to the English, and the Greek to the Russian, it was no benefit to any ; but quite the contrary.

They then asked if the Turkish Consuls did not protect the Mussulmans in India ! They consider themselves in great intercourse with the world, and spoke of the number of Euro peans they saw. The numbers were soon reduced to two Englishmen, and an English Houri, I was carrying on this conversation in broken Arabic, so I imagined that Miss Martineau must have passed this way, and that their intuitive sagacity, knowing " how to observe," had discovered the sort of com pliment that would be most gratifying* to that lady. Proceeding then to inquire how long she had stayed with them, and what she had spoken to them about, I found I had fallen into the mistake of sweet Ann Page's lover, and that the Houri was not of the feminine gender. This name, which Mahomed is made to give to the attractions of his paradise, the Christian Arabs apply to those who shew the way to ours ; and what I had taken for an accomplished lady, turned out to be a blooming Prebendary.

Dec. 20th. — As it was little out of my road, I de termined to take the village of Sourie, which had so fascinated me, on my way. The distance was but a mile, but it took me four hours to traverse it. I have spoken of this scenery putting a pencil in the hands of every tyro limner, and exemplified my words ; finding words unavailing, and the pen devoid of form and colour, I took to sketching ; now seeking to catch, so to say, an architectural detail of the stones, there the historic groupings of the mountains. The pillars of rock and the facades of precipice were in terspersed or screened with festoons of vines trained up the walls, and carried from the one to the other ; such columns stood sometimes 40 feet high, and the unbroken fronts, now and then, ranged for hundreds of yards. I was winding my way along the water course, and the promontories of squared block ran down from side to side, one into the other, forming a series of triangles ; on the opposite side some pea sants were scrambling in the same direction, and looked absurdly theatrical ; especially by the path being always hidden, so that you could not see bow they got alongthe difference is, that what would be most theatrical in our stage costume, and most stage like in our scenic painting", is less so than the costume of the people or the forms of nature.

It was endless and ever new ; you were stopped at every turn, and the pencil invited forth ; here you have ready made a study book of rock, and an album of ledges. I looked for these, as a sportsman for game ; like quails they started under my feet. After closing my sketch-book, I turned round to proceed, and found a monk standing close to me, who had been looking over my shoulder. He was a magnificent figure, with a grave and benignant coun tenance, bearing, but not yet bent by, the burden of years, with a long beard, partly silvered, not frosted with ag-e : nothingcould be more unlike the com munity I had left, but to which he belonged. He sa luted me, and seeing some sign of surprise in my man ner, he extended over me both his arms, and raising* his eyes to heaven, seemed at once to invoke on me a blessing, and to convey to me the knowledge of what the g-esture meant.

I had already moved forward before I apprehended him ; and this dumb inter change of a second, sent me away reproaching* my self with having perchance too lightly judged of the monastery I had quitted, yet gratified by the thought that these cells might enclose devout breasts, meekly bending before their Maker, benevolently regard inotheir fellow men ; and I recollected the words which the night before I had listened to as of form, " We daily pray for all men ; to-morrow morning we shall pray for you." The hell of the Sagas is Hecla and ice: the converse must be the exchange, or the mean, ot these extremes. An earthly paradise must be the charms of each season ; but the charm can be tasted only by the privation. In testing, then, the merit of the seasons, there must be a flavour at least of their ascerbity ; a chill of cold and a flush of heat; a blaze of sunshine aud a blast of storm.

Now all this I had ; and in the alternations, to which I was exposed, of temperature and of dwell ing, I began to suspect that some profound philo sophy lurked at the bottom of the eyeless reeky hovels. Who could have devised a happier process for sharpening all the appetites for draughts of day and beauty 1 Yes ; the winter is the time for the Lebanon ; and I say so with some right to be heard. I have watched, and found, and compared, and concluded, and can tell over the things you would have, and those you would lose. I shall enumerate some. Here, the earth and the rocks are the chief objects, by the beauty of their tints ; in summer, these would be concealed by an impenetrable mattingof verdure. In summer, you would have no carpeting of emerald sward on the level spots, and under the tall stalks of the pine, diffusing freshness.

In summer, you would have no waterfalls glistening on the hill sides or murmuring in the valley. In summer, no smoke would ascend from the villages — smoke, waving like a pennon, rising like a column, or spreadinglike an opal veil. In summer, there would not be the vigour of the limb or the freshness of the spirit ; and besides, in summer, we never think of what the effect in winter would be. In winter, we are always drawing the contrast with summer, and causing, in the hot house of the imagination, plants to bloom and fruits to ripen. At all events, this is the season, and this is the spot, for the artist who seeks to master the rainbow part of art ; this is the placid time for the lover of nature, that is, of solitude. And this points to my only want — a friend. Had I had a com panion, these lines might not have been written : thoug-ht would not have waited the dull record of the unimpassioned memory, or intruded thus on the hours of exhaustion and repose.

After this long-, well stocked journey, of a mile, I found myself passing under the village of Sourie, and saw ranges of arcades, through ranges of clothes, hungout to dry ; it seemed as if it were washing day, or as if the village had turned out yesterday to get washed in the rain, and were now drving themselves. Groups were basking on the terraces, and children playing in the fields or mul berry grounds ; as we worked our way through the zigzag, and up the stairs which compose the road, and down which rushed a torrent, these urchins, leavingtheir gambols, came and sat and looked down on us, uttering, to the smallest creature among them, his salutation : the drawl of the Metuali, became the Greek enclytic ; the suble hair became siibble hair. These children were charming*, with their ruddy cheeks and sparkling eyes : they are the first which attracted my attention ; they were also well clothed, and, what is more, clean, even when ragged.

How Rubens, or rather Titian, or still more, Murillo, would have rejoiced in these groups ; not in the figure alone, but in the fragments of dress ; in the tints of pure colours ; in that form which, to distinguish from our own, we call costume. Nor was it form, colour, and costume alone, but also demeanour, attitude, intuition, and all those discriminatory lines which enhance the effect to the common observer, but are read only by the eye of art. The water in the lanes had set the larg-er children on pattens, and made the smaller ones tuck up their ample trousers above the knee, so that their delicate limbs appeared with the bright flesh shining in its cleanliness, and they thronged and thronged upon you like chickens in a barn yard. As I was passing the g-ate of an outer wall^ I saw, ag'ainst the corner of a house, a little girl, not more than four, with another half her size on her back ; yet she had her foot up on the edge of a small stone trough, and another little creature, as diminutive as herself, was washing it ; another was holding up the clothes of the one so employed, that she might not get wet, and two more were watching* the operation.

I could not say that I sighed with philosophic forecast that they should e'er grow older ; but I took into my mind the little picture, the most enchanting* I ever beheld, to keep it there un changed and framed, with as much care as if it were an acknowledged masterpiece, of which the virtuoso could recount each figure, describe each line, and tell each colour. I stood for two minutes before them, but they were so intent on their work as not to observe me, and I passed along, as in a g-allery, to another group. The village equalled the promise it gave from a distance. The arcades, and windows divided by columns, were Saracenic ; the masonry surpassed everything I had seen ; in the belfry of the church the yellow and white stones were beautifully man aged, and I at once resolved, if I could obtain a hospitable roof and a friendly reception, to stay here for the night; so ascending to the roof of a house to enjoy the view, I sent down into the house to make the necessary inquiry.

A message came up from the master to say that he already had known me at Gebel Rehan, and invited me to be his guest. I at once proceeded to inspect the village, and entered about a dozen houses ; through every door was to be seen a turbaned senior or a blooming girl, sitting in a hole, foot on traddle, flying shuttle in hand ; or the spinningwheel was buzzing, or the silk reel sweeping round. Each was pleased to stop and exhibit his work. I passed the public oven ; the vase-like hole with fire at the bottom, round the sides of which the marcooks are clapped for a minute or two ; this I have already described, but here I first saw the operation. The place was just large enough to hold five or six women, who were squatted at their work ; the dough is carried to the oven ready worked, which takes an hour, the merit of the cake depending* on its long and severe manipulation; here the dough is reduced to the necessary thinness, this is effected not by a roller but by singular dexterity of hand, combined with the extreme tenacity the dough has acquired by the previous kneading.

The lump is first flattened on a stone by the hand, then taken up and danced between the hands, thrown over each alternately ; the edge being shifted round and round, it thus flies out, and when sufficiently stretched is let fall on a circular cushion of cloth, and so dabbed on the side of the hot vessel ; a few seconds suffice for the operation, and as much for the firing*. I told the women that their work and their cakes would give any one an appetite though he had eaten three dinners ; on which each hand of the party was stretched out with a specimen of its craft. They excelled any I ever tasted ; they were either soft or crisp, when the latter they had the flavour of wafers. If cakes have been lost to England and their place occupied by baker's bread, giving us an unwhole some food at a dead loss of £10,000,000 a year, it is because taste in cookery being gone, cooks were not kept to their work.

Discovering* the cakes, through insufficient kneading, to be bad, the European process is resorted to (as with the Regent's Quadrant) of destroying instead of rectifying*. I profited by the interval of time before supper to visit a convent under the guidance of a little boy. This yellow or red rock crowningthe summits, is not after all the sandstone which lies under the calcareous range, but a strange concretion of crys talline and organic matter ; it is siliceous and calcareous ; there is gneiss and oolite. I have men tioned the coarse, large, oolite shale, found under the calcareous range ; this oolite is above it. The mass is yellow, but where the oolite appears it generally varies in colour, and is a bluish grey, which mingles in the same block with yellow ; when yellow, it is of a purer and brighter tint than the mass of the rock ; it ranges to lilac, purple, red, and is even greenish.

The carbonate of lime filling; the moulds of shells is tinted with the predomi nating* colour. I extracted a small belemnite ; the transverse fracture was of the colour of garnet. I had got but a little way when clouds came rolling over the heights from the south ; or, as they say here, from " the right." So I hastened on my way. We scrambled through banks of small oak, and up and down cliffs of yellow earth and clay, intermingled with huge blocks ; at one spot there was a square reservoir on the very edge of the pre cipice ; the path was on its wall, the water issued from a corner in the rock, and a mass, which must have weighed a thousand tons, was stayed in its place ii. c above it by masonry. We could see only a few yards around us ; but the mist did not screen from sight the delicate crocus (zafron) under our feet, the fantastic sweet lemon, which, with its flower-like leaves of green embroidery turned up with purple, ornamented the stones and rocks.

The rhododen dron was still in bloom, and the myrtle bore its white feathery blossoms. The convent of Mar Elias was in the hands of masons ; it was beingrebuilt. At the end of each corridor there was a Saracenic window, with a divan for carpets ; the building' was substantial and ex cellent. On inquiringwhence the wealth came, I was told that their mulberries had been very productive. The monks were at vespers ; I looked into the church and saw, hangingall round, cotton bags, like pillow cases, containing the seed of the cocoons. As they built the monastery they deserved a place in the church. I was departing when the brother hood came forth ; various attempts were made to detain me, one was singular : an old monk brought a bottle and applied it to *my nose. The name they g-ave to their chief was Reis-el- Amma, which came so near to the Spanish El Amo, that I could not resist.

Had he not addressed me in Italian I should still have known that he had learnt a Frank tongue by his coarseness and vulgarity. He was the counterpart of my own interpreter, only fonder of arrack, which he brought out, and on which he would have made friends with me with all his heart. If the stones were superior to Mar Hanna, how in ferior the inhabitants. This sight justified my anti cipations of what this people would become if once they lost the restraint of Eastern ceremony. One man had done this for Mar Elias. One instrument out of tune will spoil an orchestra and destroy a masterpiece. I found on my return about a dozen of the prin cipal inhabitants waiting. A tray was brought in, and while I had my supper the conversation began ; they reminded me of the Greeks and Bulgarians of Roumelia before they were corrupted.