BOOK V. x^-. 73-xvi. 74 



On the west side of the Dead Sea, but out of range 

 of the noxious exhahitioiis of the coast, is the soHtary 

 tribe of the Essenes, which is remarkable beyond all 

 the other tribes in the ■whole world, as it has no 

 women and has renounccd all sexual dcsire, has no 

 money, and has only palm-trees for company. Day 

 by day the throng of refugees is recruited to an 

 equal number by numerous accessions of persons 

 tired of Hfe and driven thither by the waves of 

 fortune to adopt thcir manners. Thus through 

 thousands of ages (incredible to relate) a race in 

 wliich no one is born Hves on for ever : so proHfic 

 for their advantage is other men's weariness of Hfe ! 



L}ing below the Essenes was formerly the town 

 of Engedi, second only to Jerusalem in the fertiHty 

 of its land and in its groves of palm-trees, but now 

 Hke Jerusalem a heap of ashes. Next comes Masada, 

 a fortress on a rock, itself also not far from the 

 Dead Sea. This is the Hmit of Judaea. 



X\T. Adjoining Judaea on the side of Syria is The 

 the region of DecapoHs, so called from the number ^"""p^^^^- 

 of its to-wns, though not all writers keep to the same 

 towns in the Hst ; most hoAvever include Damascus, 

 A\ith its fertile water-meadows that drain the river 

 Chrysorrhoc, Philadelphia, Raphana (all these three 

 withdraA^-n toAvards Arabia), Sc}-thopoHs (formerly 

 Xysa, after Father Liber's nurse, whom he buried 

 there) where a colony of Scytliians are settled ; 

 Gadara, past which flows the river Yarmak; 

 Hippo mentioned already, Dion, PeHa rich with its§7i. 

 waters, Galasa, Canatha. Between and around 

 these cities run tetrarchies, each of them equal 

 to a kingdom, and they are incorporated into king- 

 doms — Trachonitis, Panias (in which is Caesarea § 7i. 



voL. II. K 277 



