Our route from Baalbec was to the far-famed cedars. They grow on the Lebanon, and on the side next the sea. Our road was directly across the plain, as the cedars are nearly opposite Baalbec. It took us about two hours and a half to cross the plain. This, at the usual mode of counting, would make it nearly eight miles wide. We found scarcely any water in the plain; there was indeed a small dry channel, and not far from it a slight trace of water, which was led along so as to water some districts; the quantity was small, and must soon have been exhausted. The noble body of water which came from the set of springs near Baalbec was separated near those ruins: one part was carried to one side, and the remainder to the other; a considerable district through which they flowed was rich with verdure. A pretty line of trees marked for a mile or two the tract of the plain through which the water passed, but at the end of a few miles they appeared to be exhausted. As the trees and richness of verdure ceased, the plain below assumed its dry and parched aspect. In these sunny plains the exhaustion of water must be very great; and I now the less marvel to find lakes which have no outlets, and rivers which are lost in the sand. They become exhausted. When we had nearly reached the foot of the Lebanon, we saw a large solitary pillar standing in the plain. We saw no ruins near it. We were told by a peasant that it was just like the pillars in Baalbec, but what it was doing there alone he was unable to tell. The ascent of Mount Lebanon was a most toilsome matter. We had to cross over one of the highest points of the mountain. There is another way which is more easy, but farther; we preferred crossing the highest place, as we might not cross here again, and wished to see the mountain in all its majesty. The first ridge which we ascended had more natural growth on it than any district I have seen in this country. It was pretty well covered with shrubs and low trees--most of them oak. The tops of most of the large ones had been cut off, I suppose for fuel. They appear to pursue a plan here, much followed in some parts of France, Savoy, and Italy, of cutting off the tops of the trees for fuel; and when the branches which shoot out have grown to the thickness of a man's arm, they are again cut off for the same purpose, and the same course still followed.