34 John Hogg, Esq., on the Geography and 



century, we learn the following exact account,* which agrees 

 very well with the site of those mounds — " the eastern limits 

 of Palaestma (including of course that part of the peninsula 

 which he elsewhere relatesf was called Palcestina Tertia), 

 reach along the Red Sea. On the shore is placed the town 

 Alias, where, the sea ending, it is contracted into a very nar- 

 row bay.*' 



Edrisi, in the 12th century, terms the steep descent from 

 the Desert El Tyh by El Nakb to Akaba— " Akaba Ailah"— 

 i.e., the "Descent of Ailah ;" and Makrisi, in the 14th cen- 

 tury, as cited by Burckhardt (p. 511), speaks of " the Akaba, 

 or steep mountain before Aila.'^ Consequently, I take it to 

 be correct that these mounds indicate the former position of 

 Elath,X on the shore of the Sea of Edom or Idumea — an arm 

 of the Red Sea. 



At a short distance from them, but westward, a large space, 

 like a marsh, seemed to be impregnated with nitre, which is 

 left incrusted in some spots upon their surface. From hence, 

 going up the extensive valley El Araba, it is found to be full 

 of sand drifts, with here and there a few trees scattered 

 about ; the torrents, after rain, flow along the west side, and 

 their waters, which are 7iot absorbed by the sand, enter the 

 sea at the north-west angle. The width of this part of the 

 Wadi is near 5 miles, but in advancing farther to the north 

 it becomes wider. The mountains on the east are high — from 

 2000 to 2500 feet ; being of granitic, or rather porphyritic 

 formation, they are highly picturesque, and have fine, lofty, 

 jagged peaks : but those on the west, which are sandstone and 

 chalk, are lower ; rising to about a level with the desert El Tyh, 

 they do not exceed 1500, or in places 1800 feet in elevation. 



* Procopii de Bell. Pers., lib, i., cap. 19. 



t Procop. de ^dificiis Justiniani, lib. v., cap. 8. Tom. ii. Edit. Par. 1663. 



X Ailah was in the middle ages considered (Robinson, i., p. 252, and Lepsius' 

 Tour, p. 20), as Elim, the sixth station of the Israelites after they passed 

 the Red Sea. But I apprehend that the error very likely arose from the word 

 A/Xa/A occurring in the Alexandrine MS., (2 Kings xvi. 6; and 2 Chron. 

 viii. 17), for AlXad, which is used in the Lxx., in those verses. So Ai\a[i 

 had here been mistaken for A/Xiifi, Elim, the word which is found in Exodus, 

 xvi. 1 ; of the LXX. 



