SKETCHES OF PALESTINE. 359 



ty in exchanging for the produce of the olive-ground and the 

 vineyard, or for their flocks and herds. Delicious wine is still pro- 

 duced in some districts, and the valleys bear plentiful crops of 

 tobacco, wheat, barley, and millet, Tacitus compares both the 

 climate and the soil, indeed, to those of Italy, and he particularly 

 specifies the palm-tree and balsam-tree as productions which gave 

 the country an advantage over his own. Among other indigenous 

 productions, may be enumerated the cedar and other varieties of 

 the pine, the cypress, the oak, the sycamore, the mulberry-tree, the 

 fig-tree, the willow, the turpentine-tree, the acacia, the aspen, the 

 arbutus, the myrtle, the almond-tree, the tamarisk, the oleander, 

 the peach-tree, the chaste-tree, the carob or locust-tree, the oskar, 

 the doom, the mustard-plant, the aloe, the citron, the apple, the 

 pomegranate, and many flowering shrubs. The country about 

 Jericho was celebrated for its balsam, as well as for its palm-trees ; 

 and two plantations of it existed during the last war between the 

 Jews and the Romans, for which both parties fought desperately. 

 But Gilead appears to have been the country in which it chiefly 

 abounded : hence the name, balm of Gilead. Since the country 

 has fallen under the Turkish dominion, it has ceased to be culti- 

 vated in Palestine, but is still found in Arabia. Other indigenous 

 productions have either disappeared, or are now confined to cir- 

 cumscribed districts. Iron is found in the mountain range of Li- 

 banus, and silk is produced in abundance in the plains of Samaria. 

 Generally speaking, the climate is mild and salubrious. During 

 the months of May, June, July, and August, the sky is for the most 

 part cloudless ; but during the night the earth is moistened with a 

 copious dew. As in Persia, sultry days are not unfrequently suc- 

 ceeded by intensely cold nights. To these sudden vicissitudes 

 references are made in the Old Testament. During the other parts 

 of the year, there is no deficiency of rain ; and to this circumstance 

 the fertility of Palestine is chiefly attributable, in the absence of 

 springs. The streams with which it is watered, with the excep- 

 tion of the river Jordan, are all brooks or torrents fed by the 

 copious periodical rains. In the dry season, the only resource of 

 the natives is, the wells or the water collected in the rainy season. 

 Hence the high importance attaching to the possession of a well in 

 this country, and the value set upon a cup of cold water. 

 Throughout Syria, the traveller perceives, at stated distances on 

 the road, small reservoirs or large vases filled with water, having 

 beside them a pot for the use of passengers when thirsty. These 

 monuments are owing to pious foundations in favor of travellers; 

 but the greater part are falling into ruin. It is remarkable that in 

 Arabia, most of the inhabited places are situated in valleys or 

 hollows: in Palestine, on the contrary, the towns and villages are 

 almost uniformly built upon hills or heights. The scarcity of the 

 rains in Arabia, and their abundance in Palestine, has been with 

 some plausibility assigned as the reason for this difference. The 

 floods in the rainy season sometimes pour down from the hills 



