"It is possible. The circle of growing wood which is made each year is a pretty good method of telling the age of a tree, and these cedars of Lebanon are considered the oldest trees in the world. Travelers have always spoken of the beauty and symmetry of these trees, with their widespreading branches and cone-like tops. All through the Middle Ages a visit to the cedars of Lebanon was regarded by many persons in the light of a pilgrimage. Some of the trees were thought to have been planted by King Solomon himself, and were looked upon as sacred relics. Indeed, the visitors took away so many pieces from the bark that it was feared the trees would be destroyed. The cedars stand in a valley a considerable way up the mountain, where the snow renders it inaccessible for part of the year."
"Are the trees just in one particular place, then?" asked Malcolm. "I thought they grew all over that country?"
"The principal and best-known grove of very large and ancient cedars of Lebanon is found in one place," replied his governess, "but there are other groves now known to exist. The famous grove was fast disappearing, until there were but few of them left. The pilgrims who went to visit them in such numbers in olden times were accompanied by monks from a monastery about four miles below, who would beseech them not to injure a single leaf. But the greatest care could not preserve the trees. Some of them have been struck down by lightning, some broken by enormous loads of snow, and others torn to fragments by tempests. Some have even been cut down with axes like any common tree. But better care is now taken of them; so that we may hope that the grove will live and increase."
"But why weren't they saved," asked Clara, "when people thought so much of them?"
"It seems to be a part of the general desolation of the land of God's chosen but rebellious people. In the third chapter of the prophet Isaiah, verses eleven and twelve, it is said, 'For the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and upon every one that is lifted up; and he shall be brought low; and upon all the cedars of Lebanon, that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan.' The same prophet says, in the tenth chapter and nineteenth verse, 'And the rest of the trees of his forest shall be few, that a child may write them.' These words have been particularly applied to the stately cedars of Lebanon, for 'the once magnificent grove is but a speck on the mountain-side. Many persons have taken it in the distance for a wood of fir trees, but on approaching nearer and taking a closer view the cedars resume somewhat of their ancient majesty. The space they cover is not more than half a mile, but, once amidst them, the beautiful fan-like branches overhead, the exquisite green of the younger trees and the colossal size of the older ones fill the mind with interest and admiration. Within the grove all is hushed as in a land of the past. Where once the Tyrian workman plied his axe and the sound of many voices came upon the ear, there are now the silence and solitude of desertion and decay.'--Malcolm," added his governess, "you may read us what is written in the sixth verse of the fourteenth chapter of Hosea."
"'His branches,'" read Malcolm, "'shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.' What does that mean, Miss Harson?"
"It means the fragrant resin which exudes from both the trunk and the cones of the beautiful cedar. It is soft, and its fragrance is like that of the balsam of Mecca. 'Everything about this tree has a strong balsamic odor, and hence the whole grove is so pleasant and fragrant that it is delightful to walk in it. The wood is peculiarly adapted for building, because it is not subject to decay, nor is it eaten of worms. It was much used for rafters and for boards with which to cover houses and form the floors and ceilings of rooms. It was of a red color, beautiful, solid and free from knots. The palace of Persepolis, the temple of Jerusalem and Solomon's palace were all in this way built with cedar, and the house of the forest of Lebanon was perhaps so called from the quantity of this wood used in its construction.' We are told in First Kings that Solomon 'built also the house of the forest of Lebanon[24],' and that 'he made three hundred shields of beaten gold' and 'put them in the house of the forest of Lebanon[25].' All the drinking-vessels, too, of this wonderful palace, which is always spoken of as 'the house of the forest of Lebanon,' were of pure gold, and its magnificence shows how highly the beautiful cedar-wood was valued."
[24] I Kings vii. 2.
[25] I Kings x. 17.