[p.158]to sleep, and walked up to the castle, which is distant six hours and a half from Shennyn. It is built upon the top of an insulated hill, which communicates on its western side only, with the chain of mountains we had passed. Below the walls of the castle, on the east side, is the town of Hossn, consisting of about one hundred and fifty houses. The castle is one of the finest buildings of the middle age I ever saw. It is evidently of European construction; the lions, which are carved over the gate, were the armorial bearings of the Counts of Thoulouse, whose name is often mentioned in the history of the crusades. It is surrounded by a deep paved ditch, on the outside of which runs a wall flanked with bastions and towers. The walls of the castle itself are very regularly constructed, and are ornamented in many places with high gothic arches, projecting several feet from the wall. The inner castle, which is seventy paces in breadth, and one hundred and twenty in length, is defended by bastions. A broad staircase, under a lofty arched passage, leads up from the gate into the castle, and was accessible to horsemen. In the interior we particularly admired a large saloon, of the best Gothic architecture, with arches intersecting each on the roof. In the middle of a court-yard we noticed a round pavement of stones elevated about a foot and a half above the ground, and eighteen paces in diameter; we could not account for its use; it is now called El Sofra, or the table. There are many smaller apartments in the castle, and several gothic chambers, most of which are in perfect preservation; outside the castle an aqueduct is still standing, into which the rain water from the neighbouring hills was conducted by various channels, and conveyed by the aqueduct into the castle ditch, which must have served as a reservoir for the use of the garrison, while it added at the same time to the strength of the fortress. Figures of lions are seen in various places on the outer wall, as well as Arabic inscriptions, MAR DJORDJOS. [p.159]which were too high to be legible from below. In other places, amidst half effaced inscriptions, the name of El Melek el Dhaher is distinguished. I saw no Greek inscriptions, nor any remains of Grecian architecture. The following is upon a stone at the entrance of one of the peasants' huts, of which there are about fifty within the castle and on the parapets: [Latin]. There are roses sculptured over the entrance of several apartments.