Having discharged our visit to Ustan pasha, we rode out after dinner to view the marine. It is about half an hour distant from the city. The port is an open sea rather than an inclosed harbour. However it is in part defended from the force of the waves by two small islands about two leagues out from the shore, one of which is called the Bird, the other the Coney Island, being so named from the creatures which they severally produce. For its security from pirates it has several castles, or rather square towers, built all along upon the shore at convenient distances. They are, I think, six in number; but at present void of all manner of force both of men and ammunition.
In the fields near the shore appeared many heaps of ruins and pillars of granite, and several other indications that there must have been anciently some considerable buildings this way, which agrees very well with what Casaubon, in his notes upon Strabo[537], quotes out of Diodorus, viz., that the place called Tripoli was anciently a cluster of three cities, standing at a furlong's distance from each other, of which the first was a seat of the Radii, the second of the Sidonians, the third of the Tyrians; and from hence it is probable that Tripoli was a name given at first to three distinct but adjacent places, and not to one city, built, as is usually said, by the mingled interest of Tyre, Sidon, and Aradus; it being hard to conceive how three such independent commonwealths should thus concur in the founding of one city between them; and harder, how they should agree in governing it afterwards.
Sunday, March 14.—We continued still in Tripoli.
March 15.—Resolving to prosecute our journey this day, we had given orders to our muleteers, some time before, to be ready to attend us; but they had been so frightened by the pasha of Sidon's servants, who were abroad in quest of mules for the service of their master, that they were run away, and could not be heard of; a disappointment which gave us much vexation, and left us to no other remedy but only to supply ourselves with fresh beasts where we could find them.
Having, after much trouble, put ourselves in a new posture of travelling, we parted from Tripoli at three o'clock in the afternoon. Proceeding close by the sea, we came, in one hour and a half, to Callemone, a small village just under Bell-Mount. From hence, putting forward till near eight o'clock, we came to a high promontory, which lay directly across our way, and broke off abruptly at the sea-side, with a cape very high and almost perpendicular. In order to pass this barrier we turned up on the left hand into a narrow valley, through which our road lay; and, it being now late, we took up our quarters there under some olive-trees, having come, in all, about five hours.
The promontory which terminated our journey seems to be that called by Strabo[538] τὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ πρόσωπον, or the face of God, assigned by that author for the end of Mount Libanus. Between this place and Tripoli he mentions, likewise, a city called Trieris; but of this we saw no footsteps, unless you will allow for such some sepulchres which we saw cut in the rocks about one hour and a half before we arrived at the promontory.
March 16.—We were no sooner in motion this morning, but we were engaged in the difficult work of crossing over the forementioned cape. The pass over it lies about a mile up from the sea. We found it very deep and rugged; but in an hour or thereabout mastered it, and arrived in a narrow valley on the other side, which brought the sea open to us again. Near the entrance of this valley stands a small fort, erected upon a rock perpendicular on all sides, the walls of the building being just adequate to the sides of the rock, and seeming almost of one continued piece with them. This castle is called Temseida, and commands the passage into the valley.
In about half an hour from this place we came even with Patrone, a place esteemed to be the ancient Botrus. It is situated close by the sea; and, our road lying somewhat higher up in the land, we diverted a little out of the way to see it. We found in it some remains of an old church and a monastery; but these are now perfectly ruined and desolate, as is likewise the whole city; nor is there any thing left in it to testify it has been a place of any great consideration.
In three hours more we came to Gibyle, called by the Greeks Byblus, a place once famous for the birth and temple of Adonis. It is pleasantly situated by the sea-side. At present it contains but a little extent of ground, but yet more than enough for the small number of its inhabitants. It is compassed with a dry ditch and a wall, with square towers in it at about every forty yards' distance. On its south side it has an old castle. Within it is a church exactly of the same figure with that at Tortosa, only not so entire as that. Besides this it has nothing remarkable, though anciently it was a place of no mean extent as well as beauty, as may appear from the many heaps of ruins, and the fine pillars that are scattered up and down in the gardens near the town.
Gibyle is probably the country of the Giblites, mentioned Josh. xiii. 5. King Hiram made use of the people of this place in preparing materials for Solomon's temple, as may be collected from the first of Kings, v. 18, where the word which our translator has rendered stone-squarers, in the Hebrew is גבלים, Giblim, or Giblites, and in the LXXII Interpreters, Βύβλιοι, that is, the Men of Byblus; the former using the Hebrew, the latter the Greek name of this place. The same difference may be observed likewise in Ezekiel, xxvii. 9, where this place is again mentioned; the ancients of Gebal, says our translation, following the Hebrew; instead of which you read in the LXXII. again οἱ πρεσβύτεροι Βυβλίων, the elders of Bybli or Byblus.