SYRIA. The Semitic or Aramaic population overspreading Syria――which name is generally applied to the country lying between the Euphrates and Arabian desert on the east, and the Mediterranean on the west――had early divided itself into various independent states or kingdoms, which ultimately resolved themselves, it would appear, into three. These were _Phœnicia_, a narrow strip of coast-land, extending from Mount Carmel to the river Eleutheros; _Palestine_, or the _Holy Land_, including the country south of Phœnicia, between the Arabian desert and the Mediterranean, as well as the inland district lying between Mount Carmel and Mount Herman; and _Syria Proper_, whose capital was Damascus, and which, when the power of the Damascan kings was at its highest, included all the country except Palestine and Phœnicia. Syrian history possesses no independent importance; we pass, therefore, to the history of the Phœnician and Jewish nations. THE PHŒNICIANS. Phœnicia was an exceedingly small country, its length being only about 120 miles, and its breadth nowhere greater than 20 miles. Indeed it may be described as a mere slip of coast-land, sufficiently large to accommodate a range of port towns, such as a merchant people required. The most northern of these Phœnician cities was Aradus, situated on a small island; the most southern was the famous Tyre; and between the two were situated many others, of which the chief were Sidon, Berytus, Tripolis, and Byblus. The greater part of the population was contained in these cities, the rural population being small in proportion. Originally, Phœnicia was divided into a number of little states or communities, each having a town for its metropolis, with a hereditary king of its own; and ere the country was restricted by the formation of the Jewish nation, the number of these Phœnician or Canaanitish principalities must have been considerable. The Phœnicians were a fragment of the Canaanites of Scripture; and doubtless in the annals of the separate Phœnician towns, such as Tyre, Sidon, and Aradus, were preserved record from the Phœnician point of view, of many of those ancient transactions which are related in the Scriptural account of the settlement of the Jews in Canaan. Without going back, however, into the remoter period of Phœnician history, one of the questions connected with which is, whether Tyre (founded, it was said, B. C. 2700) or Sidon was the more ancient town, let us give a summary view of the nature of the Phœnician civilization at the period of its highest celebrity――namely, from B. C. 1200 to B. C. 700, at which time we find Tyre exercising a presiding influence over the other Phœnician communities.