94 Chronicles of Science. | Jan., 
pendent observers with separate instruments, assigns 1,292 feet as 
the depression on the 12th of March, 1865, a line of drift wood 
marking 2°5 feet above this as the level at some period of the year, 
and the testimony of Europeans and Bedouins unite in testifying 
that the sea sinks at least six feet in the summer. The greatest 
depression therefore would be 1,298 feet below the Mediterranean, 
and when the sea is highest the difference would only be 1,289°5 feet. 
The success of this preparatory expedition to Palestine has led 
to the formation of a Society which represents opinions of all kinds 
on religious matters, and a great variety of speculation on scientific 
points, for the purpose of extending this survey and carrymg out 
toa far greater extent the systematic exploration of many points of 
interest in the Holy Land. All the natural sciences are to receive 
due attention, and archeology is to be assisted, as it has never been 
previously, by well-arranged and systematic excavations. Certainly 
in the present day it would be well that we should do somewhat 
towards illustrating the course of Jewish history, by an appeal to 
Jewish antiquities and topography, and by a thorough sifting of the 
geological, zoological, and botanical peculiarities of the Holy Land. 
What has already been done in Assyria and Egypt will in more than 
one way be advantageous for this work. . Experience in the great 
work of exploration has been gained, and that from the very nations 
who most of all influenced the politics and the art of the Jews. 
We now see that the politics of the Israelites were influenced at one 
time by Egypt, at another time by Assyria or Babylonia. If there- 
fore we find at Nineveh and Thebes undoubted traces of Jewish 
doings, how much more light may we not expect to have thrown 
upon explorations in Palestine, by our previous knowledge of 
Egyptian and Assyrian inscriptions, antiquities, and architecture ? 
As a kind of precursor to this more full and systematic research, 
Mr. Tristram has published a work which shows the amount of 
light that one man in a short period can throw upon a subject 
touched upon, indeed, by hundreds in all ages, but never scientifi- 
cally exhausted. Mr. Tristram spent about eight months in various 
parts of the country, and was assisted by a young botanist, 
a zoologist, one or two sketchers, and a photographer, so that 
much of his information has a freshness not often observable in 
travellers over a well-known region. Mr. Tristram spent a con- 
siderable time in the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea, He nearly 
exhausts this subject. Contrary to our usual notion of this lake 
Mr. Tristram describes the neighbourhood as very thickly popu- 
lated both by beasts and birds of great variety; the sea itself, 
however, is “dead,” inasmuch as it contains not a living thing, fish 
or mollusk, and even those living in the salt pools near the shore 
would not survive when placed in the water of the sea. The 
geological peculiarities of the valley do not escape this traveller. 
