616 CANALS TO THE DEAD SEA. 
Canals communicating with Dead Sea. 
The project of Captain Allen for opening a new route to 
India by cuts between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, 
and between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea, presents many 
interesting considerations.* The hypsometrical observations of 
Bertou, Roth, and others, render it highly probable, if not cer- 
tain, that the watershed in the Wadi-el-Araba between the 
Dead Sea and the Red Sea is not less than three hundred 
feet above the main level of the latter, and if this is so, the 
execution of a canal from the one sea to the other is quite out 
of the question. But the summit level between the Mediter- 
ranean and the Jordan, near Jezreel, is believed to be little, if 
at all, more than one hundred feet above the sea, and the dis- 
tance is so short that the cutting of a channel through the 
dividing ridge would probably be found by no means an im- 
practicable undertaking. Although, therefore, we have no 
reason to believe it possible to open a navigable channel to 
India by way of the Dead Sea, there is not much doubt that the 
basin of the latter might be made accessible from the Medi- 
terranean. 
The level of the Dead Sea lies 1,316.7 feet below that of 
the ocean. It is bounded east and west by mountain ridges, 
rising to the height of from 2,000 to 4,000 feet above the 
ocean. From its southern end, a depression called the Wadi- 
el-Araba extends to the Gulf of Akaba, the eastern arm of the 
Red Sea. The Jordan empties into the northern extremity of 
the Dead Sea, after having passed through the Lake of Tibe- 
rias at an elevation of 663.4 feet above the Dead Sea, or 653.3 
below the Mediterranean, and drains a considerable valley north 
of the lake, as well as the plain of Jericho, which lies between 
the lake and the sea. If the waters of the Mediterranean were 
admitted freely into the basin of the Dead Sea, they would 
raise its surface to the general level of the ocean, and con- 
* The Dead Sea a new Route to India, 2 vols, 12mo0, London, 1855. 
