4Pd SCRIPTURAL ASSOCIATIONS. [1848. 



swiftly between bold and precipitous banks from fifteen to 

 thirty feet high. Here it is a placid streamlet, softly laving 

 the white fringy clusters of the asphodel, and the long plumy 

 tresses of the willow and the oleander ; and there, a moun- 

 tain torrent, bounding and foaming and tossing over its rocky 



bed. 



Numerous rapids and cascades obstruct the navigation of 

 the river, and at its embouchure into the Dead Sea, where it 

 is about one hundred and eighty yards across, it is thirteen 

 hundred feet lower than its fountain head, at the foot of Mount 

 Hermon. In the course of its descent from the Sea of Tibe- 

 rias to the Lake Asphaltites, it receives several tributaries. 

 Those coming in on the west are mere torrents : the principal 

 affluents on the east, are the Sheriat-el-Mandhur, (the an- 

 cient Jarmok, or Yermak,) and the Jabok, which flows down 

 through the Wady Zurka. Below the mouth of this tribu- 

 tary, which is not far from twenty miles above the Dead Sea, 

 the evidences of a volcanic formation multiply rapidly, and 

 there seems to have been a depression of the whole bed of the 

 river, south of this point, produced, as appearances would 

 indicate, by some sudden convulsion of nature. The water 

 of the river is for the most part sweet ; but now and then 

 it is somewhat brackish, occasioned, doubtless, by the salt 

 streams that mingle their contents with it. Owing to the 

 abundance of hot springs along the borders of the stream, and 

 the heat of the climate, its temperature is cpiite warm. It 

 is usually of a white sulphurous color, and, except as has been 

 mentioned, is free from any taste or smell. According to 

 the analysis of Dr. Marcet, it contains but about one three- 

 hundredth part of the proportion of solid matter found in the 

 water of the Dead Sea.* 



To the biblical scholar, the Jordan is replete with interest- 

 ing associations. When Lot separated himself from Abram, 

 he "chose him all the plain of Jordan."! Its waters were 

 divided when the Ark of the Covenant was carried into the 

 stream, and the children of Israel, under Joshua their leader 



* Philosophical Transactions, 1807. t Genesis xiii, 11. 



