[p.7] Arabs, and when dyed blue, as Kombazes, or gowns, by the men.
There are more than twenty dyeing houses in Zahle, in which indigo only
is employed. The Pike [The Pike is a linear measure, equal to two feet
English, when used for goods of home manufacture, and twenty-seven
inches for foreign imported commodities.] of the best of this cotton
cloth, a Pike and a half broad, costs fifty paras, (above 1s. 6d.
English). The cotton is brought from Belad Safad and Nablous. They
likewise fabricate Abbayes, or woollen mantles. There are above one
hundred horsemen in the town. In June 1810, when the Emir Beshir joined
with his corps the army of Soleiman Pasha, to depose Youssef Pasha, he
took from Zahle 400 men, armed with firelocks.

On the west side of the town, in the bottom of the Wady, lies the
monastery of Mar Elias, inhabited by a prior and twenty monks. It has
extensive grape and mulberry plantations, and on the river side a well
cultivated garden, the products of which are sold to the town's people.
The prior received me with great arrogance, because I did not stoop to
kiss his hands, a mark of respect which the ecclesiastics of this
country are accustomed to receive. The river of Zahle, or Berdoun, forms
the frontier of the Bekaa, which it separates from the territory
belonging to the Emir of Baalbec, called Belad Baalbec; so that whatever
is northward from the bridge of the Berdoun, situated in the valley, a
quarter of an hour below Zahle, belongs to Belad Baalbec; and whatever
is south-ward, to the Bekaa. Since Soleiman Pasha has governed Damascus,
the authority of the Emir Beshir has been in some measure extended over
the Bekaa, but I could not inform myself of the distinct laws by which
it had been regulated. The Pashas of Damascus, and the Emir Beshirs,
have for many years been in continual dispute about their rights over
the villages of the Bekaa.