Ain Zehalty, a village situated in the heart of Lebanon, has been already mentioned.[1] Mr. Bird says, "We now have there five church-members. There have been regular Sabbath services under the charge of the native helper, Khalil. The audience has been on the increase, and is now not only larger than that in Deir el-Komr, but is composed of better materials. Those who come desire instruction, and are regular attendants and declared Protestants." An Ain Zehaltian, when out of his village, if not a Druze, was set down at once as a Protestant. The day school in that place had forty scholars, and half as many attended the evening school for adults. This school was for the special purpose of studying the Bible, and the pupils had gone through the historical books of the Old and New Testaments. Their custom on Saturday and Sabbath evenings was to read the devotional parts, and hold a prayer meeting. [1] Vol. i. p. 383. Mr. Ford made a visit to Hasbeiya in February, 1857, with Mr. Jones, Secretary of the Turkish Missions Aid Society. He had never before been in that region, and speaks highly of the native laborers. Of the church-members he says: "When compared with the rock from which they were hewn, and the hole of the pit from which they were digged, they show the genuineness of the work of grace in their hearts." "The signs of the times," he adds, "in the community around, are most encouraging. I will only refer now to a remarkable stirring up of the Maronites to defend themselves against the inroads made by the gospel upon their hitherto solid ranks. Their ecclesiastics have always maintained an attitude of proud contempt, as though conscious of the strength of their hold upon their people, and they have rarely deigned to come into personal contact with the despised preachers of the gospel. But the serious diminution of their numbers in various parts south of us, and the diffusion of spiritual light among the rest of their flocks, have forced them down from their assumed elevation, and now they select the ablest of their priests, ordain him bishop, and send him on a crusade through Deir el-Komr, Hasbeiya, Merj Aiun, and so on to Alma, where the spirit of Asaad es-Shidiak, the modern martyr of Syria, seems to be revived in the hearts of a simple people, preparing them to brave death itself for the Gospel's sake. This bishop has sought public discussions with Mr. Bird, at Deir el-Komr, and also with Mr. Wortabet, at Hasbeiya. In the latter place there had been two such discussions held just before we arrived. In the first, the bishop was effectually caught in his own craftiness, and so completely worsted, that he and his friends came to the second session prepared to regain by violence the advantage they had lost in argument; and the result was a stormy debate, terminated abruptly by an assault upon some of the Protestants present."