after they had done this wickedness, fell to fighting among themselves.

From the south end of the Dead Sea, this great road follows the shore below as far as to 'Ain Jidy, and then ascends the pass. Along that part of the sea we heard of no road upon the high land above. Indeed such an upper road would be unnecessary; since it must naturally be longer than that below; and it would moreover be far less practicable on account of the deep vallies of the Ghâr, Khŭbarah, Seiyâl, and others, which it must cross.—It was doubtless by this same Arab road that the Moabites and Ammonites came up against king Jehoshaphat, in the incursion to which we have already had occasion to allude.1

The view of this evening from our lofty encampment, was most romantic. The whole Dead Sea lay before us; the full moon rose in splendour over the eastern mountains, and poured a flood of silvery light into the deep dark chasm below, illuminating the calm surface of the sluggish waters. All was still as the silence of the grave. Our Arabs were sleeping around us upon the ground; only the tall pensive figure of the Sheikh was seen sitting before the door of our tent, his eyes fixed intently upon us as we wrote. He indeed was ever the last to lie down at night, and the first to rise up with the dawn.

Saturday, May 12th. Having a long day's journey before us in order to reach Jericho, we caused the luggage to be mostly packed over night; and rising very early, took our breakfast in the open air on the brink of the cliff, that our servants meantime might pack the tent. The sun rose gloriously over the eastern mountains and the abyss below us, over which a slight mist was now rising; and the song of numerous

1) 2 Chr. xx. 1, 2. See pp. 214, 215, above.

birds came up sweetly on the ear from the thicket around the fountain.

We set off at 5 o'clock, an earlier start than we had ever yet been able to make in our regular travelling; and proceeded through a desert tract of tableland, much like that of yesterday, often intersected by small Wadys, and having a range of chalky mountains on the left. At 5h 50′ we came to a Wady running to join the gulf by which the next valley, Ghuweir, descends to the shore. On the left were traces of a former encampment of the Ta'âmirah; this being the place to which they retired after the rebellion of 1834.1 A few minutes further a road from Bethlehem crossed our path, leading to the descent or pass of the Ghuweir on the right. The Ghuweir is a small fountain on the shore at the foot of the precipice, similar to that at 'Ain Terâbeh. At 6h 05' we came upon the Wady called Râs el-Ghuweir, which breaks down through the cliffs to the shore near the fountain. It rises in the interior near Deir Ibn 'Öbeid, at a pass called el- Kussâbeh; it was here deep, rugged, and difficult to be crossed. Another Wady was also mentioned, called 'Alya, rising apparently near the same place, and running into Wady er-Râhib, the prolongation of the Kidron.

Proceeding for nearly two hours and a half over a similar tract, surrounded by abrupt chalky hills and cliffs, and crossing many short Wadys, whose banks the animals could hardly descend and ascend, we came at half-past 8 o'clock to the deep and almost impassable ravine of the Kidron, coming down by Mâr Sâba, and thence called Wady er-Râhib, "Monk's Valley;" but here bearing also the name Wady enNâr, "Fire Valley." At this place it was running 1) See pp. 176, 177, above. 32

VOL. II.

nearly E. S. E. in a deep narrow channel between perpendicular walls of rock, as if worn away by the rushing waters between these desolate chalky hills. There was however no water in it now; nor had there apparently been any for a long time. It enters the sea in the angle formed by Râs el-Feshkhah, which here projects from the western cliffs towards the E. N. E. and contracts the north end of the sea by giving to the coast beyond it nearly the same direction.

Turning more to the right, nearly E. N. E. and crossing with difficulty several short Wadys or ravines, we came out at 8 o'clock upon Râs el-Feshkhah, the northernmost promontory of the Dead Sea, still eight hundred or a thousand feet above its waters. Here again we had a perfect view of the north end of the sea and a portion of the Ghôr or valley of the Jordan beyond, with the eastern mountains; and could also distinguish Usdum at the southern end. While we were taking our observations, two ravens and a small hawk were wheeling in rapid flights over the sea.'1

Beyond the promontory of Râs el-Feshkhah the shore continues to run N. E. by E. quite to the corner of the sea. But the promontory itself on that side, and the mountains further on, retire gradually from the sea in a direction nearly North, leaving between their base and the shore a triangular plain, at first narrow, but afterwards quite wide. The road passes down obliquely along the northern side of the promontory to 'Ain el-Feshkhah at the bottom. The descent is by no means so great nor so steep as at the pass of

1) From Râs el-Feshkhah we obtained the following bearings: N. W. corner of the Dead Sea and the intervening line of shore, N. E. by E. Mouth of the Jordan E. N. E. Kusr Hajla, a ruin in the plain of Jericho, N. 28° E. Jebel Jil'âd or J. es-Salt N. 44° E. Mouth

of Zurka Ma'in S. 42° E. Do. of el-Môjib S. 21° E. Peninsula, north end, S. Do. south end S. 9° W. Usdum, east end, S. 11° W. Do. west end S. 15° W. Point of western shoal S. 15° W. Râs elMersed S. 19° W.

'Ain Jidy; but the path itself is worse, the rocks and stones not being at all cleared away. This pass is one of the roads from Mâr Sâba to the Jordan.1 Sending on the men and horses ahead, we followed on foot at five minutes past nine. When they were about half way down the pass, a shot was heard; and then we saw the Arabs scrambling down the rocks in eager chase. They had fired at a Beden, it was supposed; but after all their pains it turned out to be a poor rabbit. They said however that the Beden are numerous in these mountains, as well as the wild-boar.

Meantime the servants and muleteers were left to get on with the horses as they could; and being unacquainted with the way, and the path blind, their progress was attended with some danger. One of the servants' horses, at a steep and difficult place, got out of the road; on attempting to lead him back, he refused to move; and pulling at the bridle, lost his footing and fell backwards ten or twelve feet, down a ledge of the rocks. We were still some distance behind; and I could not help uttering a cry of compassion as the poor animal fell, supposing it impossible that he should not be killed outright, or have at least some legs or bones broken. But he soon got up and went on as before, seeming to make nothing of it. The cooking-utensils, which were slung in bags across his back, suffered more; but even they escaped with slighter damage than could have been expected.

We found here specimens of the well-known black bituminous stone, 'stink-stone,' which has been already mentioned. In one instance it appeared in the form of a casing or crust, enclosing other stones like a sort of conglomerate; looking much as if it had once

1) I am not sure whether this was the route taken by Pococke from Mâr Saba; Vol. II. p. 34. fol.

2) See p. 221, above, for this and other minerals on the shore of the Dead Sea.

flowed down the path in a liquid state, and there become solid among the stones as it cooled.-The lower part of the mountain consists here wholly of conglomerate, containing stones of all sizes; some of which indeed are large rocks.

We reached the bottom of the descent and the fountain 'Ain el-Feshkhah at 9 o'clock. The fountain boils up here near the shore, a very copious stream, or rather streams, of limpid water, beautiful to the eye, but brackish and having a slight taste of sulphuretted hydrogen. Its temperature is 80° F. The wet and marshy ground around the fountain, is covered by a dense thicket of canes, extending for half an hour or more along the shore, showing that the water flows out along this whole distance, or at least moistens the soil. Near the fountain are the foundations of a small square tower and of other small buildings; whether ancient or not, we could not tell. We stopped here for thirty-five minutes, and found the heat almost intolerable. The cane-brake intercepted the sea-breeze, while the beams of the burning sun were reflected down upon us from the cliffs above, rendering the spot like an oven. The thermometer stood at 84° F. The cliffs here and further North we estimated at from one thousand to twelve hundred feet in height.

This fountain and those of the Ghuweir and Terâbeh are within the territories of the Ta'âmirah. Besides these and the waters of Wady Sudeir, 'Ain Jidy, and Wady 'Areijeh or the Ghâr, our guides knew of no fountain on the western coast of the Dead Sea; nor did we anywhere hear of any other.

Leaving 'Ain el-Feshkhah at twenty minutes past ten, we rode between the cane-brake and the mountain, passing many masses of conglomerate rocks fallen down from above; indeed the whole precipice on our