When the Old Testament writers wished to describe that which was consummately beautiful, rich, strong, proud and enduring, they drew their similes from Hermon and Lebanon, and the climax of the “glory of Lebanon” they found in the “cedars of God.”[44] Would they express the full perfection of that which was choice,[45] excellent,[46] goodly,[47] high and lifted up,[48] they pictured “a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a forest-like shade.... Its stature was exalted above all of the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long.... All the birds of the heavens made their nests in its boughs; and under its branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young.... Thus was it fair in its greatness, in the length of its branches ... nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto it for beauty.”[49] The cedar of Lebanon must not be confounded with the various smaller trees which in America are known as “cedars.” It is own brother to the great deodar or god-tree of the Himalayas and the forest giants on the high slopes of the Atlas, Taurus and Amanus ranges. In the days when Hiram of Tyre provided timber for Solomon’s Temple, large cedar woods spread over Lebanon, and apparently grew also on the sides of Anti-Lebanon and Hermon; but generation after generation these trees became fewer in number. Even in the sixth century, Justinian found it difficult to secure sufficiently large beams for the Church of the Virgin (now the Mosque el-Aksa) in Jerusalem. Many efforts were made to preserve the trees, which had long been considered of a peculiar sanctity. High up on the rocky sides of Lebanon, Hadrian carved his imperial command that the groves should be left untouched. Modern Maronite patriarchs have excommunicated those who cut down the “trees of God.” But the roving goats who nibble the tender young saplings have regarded neither emperor nor patriarch. Now there is little timber of any kind in Syria, and the profiles of the mountains cut sharp against the sky. Of the cedars there remain only seven groups, the finest of which is the one we are visiting, above the village of Besherreh.