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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



the hillsides, and the country would then 

 have been more pleasing to Northern 

 eyes, to which mountains are dear be- 

 cause rills make music and green boughs 

 wave in the wind. 



the; rive;r kishon 



To this general description there are 

 certain exceptions which must not be for- 

 gotten. The high ridge of Mount Carmel 

 rises grandly from the sea, and on its 

 land side breaks down in bold declivities 

 and deep glens upon the valley through 

 which the Kishon, an almost perennial 

 stream, finds its way to the Bay of Acre. 

 Here, upon the slopes of a long ridge,_ on 

 the other side of the Kishon, there is a 

 wildering forest of ancient holm-oaks, all 

 the more beautiful because it is the one 

 considerable stretch of natural wood in 

 the whole country west of Jordan. 



On the other side of that river the 

 slopes of the plateau which runs east- 

 ward into the desert, the Bashan and 

 Gilead of the Old Testament, have also 

 patches of woodland left, and in the can- 

 yons that cut deep through these slopes 

 there is many a picturesque scene where 

 the brooks, fabbok and Yarniuk, leap in 

 tiny waterfalls from ledge to ledge of the 

 cliffs. These are the only brooks in all 

 the country, these and the Kishon, which 

 itself is reduced in late summer to a line 

 of pools. 



VIEW FROM TABOR 



Of the wider views there are two that 

 ought to be noted. One is beautiful. It 

 is the prospect from the top of Mount 

 Tabor, a few miles east of Nazareth, 

 over the wide plain of Esdraelon, spe- 

 cially charming in April, when the green 

 of the upspringing wheat and barley con- 

 trasts with the rich red of the strips of 

 newly plowed land that lie between. 



The other is grand and solemn. Erom 

 the Mount of Olives, and indeed from 

 the higher parts of Jerusalem itself, one 

 looks across the deep hollow where the 

 Jordan, a little below Jericho, pours its 

 turbid waters into the Dead Sea, and sees 

 beyond this hollow the long, steep wall 

 of the mountains of Moab. 



These mountains are the edge of the 

 great plateau, 3,000 feet higher than the 



Dead Sea, which extends into the Great 

 Desert of Northern Arabia. Among 

 them is conspicuous the projecting ridge 

 of Nebo, or Pisgah, from which Moses 

 looked out upon that Promised Land 

 which he was not permitted to enter. 

 These mountains are the background of 

 every eastward view from the heights of 

 ludea. Always impressive, they become 

 weirdly beautiful toward sunset, when 

 the level light turns their stern gray to 

 exquisite purples and a tender lilac that 

 deepens into violet as the night begins to 

 fall. 



PROSPECTS THAT PLEASE 



In eastern Galilee also there are noble 

 prospects of distant Hermon ; nor is there 

 any coast scenery anywhere finer than 

 that of the seaward slopes of Lebanon 

 behind Sidon and Beirut. But Hermon 

 and Lebanon (as already remarked) lie 

 outside Palestine and would need a de- 

 scription to themselves. Damascus, seen 

 from the heights above, its glittering 

 white embosomed in orchards, is a marvel 

 of beauty — a pearl set in emeralds, say 

 the Muslims. Petra, far off in the Arabian 

 Desert to the south, is a marvel of wild 

 grandeur, with its deep, dark gorges and 

 towering crags ; but these also lie outside 

 Palestine. 



THE SEA OE GAEIEEE 



Though not comparable in beauty 

 either to the lakes of Britain or to those 

 that lie among the Alps, or to Lake 

 George in New York and Lake Tahoe 

 in California, the Sea of Galilee has a 

 quiet charm of its own. 



The shores are bare of wood and the 

 encircling mountains show no bold peaks ; 

 yet the slopes of the hills, sometimes 

 abruptly, sometimes falling in soft and 

 graceful lines, have a pleasing variety, 

 and from several points a glimpse may 

 be caught of the snowy top of Hermon 

 rising beyond the nearer ranges. A great 

 sadness broods over the silent waters. 

 The cities that decked it like a necklace 

 have, all but Tiberias, vanished so utterly 

 that archeologists dispute over their sites. 

 There is little cultivation, and where half 

 a million of people are said to have lived 

 at the beginning of our era, not 5,000 are 



