He Is
Extremely Attentive And Hospitable To English Travellers.
The principal commerce of Tripoli is in silk produced upon the mountain,
of which it exports yearly about 800 quintals or cwt., at about £80.
sterling per quintal.
Formerly the French merchants used to take silk in
return for their goods, as it was difficult to obtain money in the
Levantine trade; it is true that they sold it to a disadvantage in
France; yet not so great as they would have done had they insisted on
being reimbursed ready money, upon which they must have paid the
discount. The silk was bought up at Marseilles by the merchants of
Barbary, who thus procured it at a lower rate than they could do at
Tripoli. This intercourse however has ceased in consequence of the ruin
of French trade, and the Moggrebyns now visit Tripoli themselves, in
search of this article, bringing with them colonial produce, indigo, and
tin, which they buy at Malta. The sale of West India coffee has of late
increased greatly in Syria; the Turks have universally adopted the use
of it, because it is not more than half the price of Mokha coffee; a
considerable market is thus opened to the West India planters, which is
not likely to be interrupted, until the Hadj is regularly re-
established, the principal traffic of which was in coffee.
The next chief article of exportation is sponges; they are procured on
the sea shore; but the best are found at a little depth in
[p.168]the sea. The demand for them during the last two years has been
very trifling; but I was told that fifty bales of twelve thousand
sponges each might be yearly furnished; their price is from twenty-five
to forty piastres per thousand. Soap is exported to Tarsous, for
Anatolia and the Greek islands, as well as alkali for its manufacture,
which is procured in the eastern desert. It is a curious fact, that soap
should also be imported into Tripoli from Candia; the reason is that the
Cretan soap contains very little alkali; here one-fourth of its weight
of alkali is added to it, and in this state it is sold to advantage. The
other exports are about one hundred or one hundred and twenty quintals
of galls from the Anzeyry mountains: of yellow wax, from Libanus, about
one hundred and twenty quintals, at about one hundred and fifty piastres
per quintal; of Rubia tinctorum [Arabic], which grows in the plains of
Homs and Hamah, about fourteen hundred quintals, at from twenty to
twenty-four piastres per quintal; of scammony, very little; of tobacco,
a few quintals, which are sent to Egypt.
The territory of Tripoli extends over the greater part of Mount Libanus.
The Pashalik is divided into the following districts, or Mekatta
[Arabic], as they are called: viz. El Zawye [Arabic], or the lower part
of Mount Libanus to the right of the Kadisha,--Djebbet Bshirrai
[Arabic], which lies round the village of that name near the Cedars.--El
Kella [Arabic],--El Koura [Arabic], or the lower part of Mount Libanus
to the left of the Kadisha.--El Kattaa [Arabic], or the mountains
towards Batroun;--Batroun [Arabic],--Djebail [Arabic],--El Fetouh, over
Djebail, as far as Kesrouan.--Akkar [Arabic], the northern declivity of
Mount Libanus, a district governed at present by Aly Beg, a man famous
for his generosity, liberality, and knowledge of Arabian literature.--El
Shara [Arabic], also under the government of Aly Beg.--El Dhannye
[Arabic].--The mountains to the N. and N.W. of Bshirrai.--El Hermel
[Arabic], towards Baalbec, on the
[p.169] eastern declivity of the Libanus; Szaffeita [Arabic], and
Tartous [Arabic]. The greater part of the mountaineers are Christians;
in Bshirrai they are all Christians; in Akkar, Shara, and Koura, three-
fourths are Christians.
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