On the Valley of the Jordan and the Dead Sea. 7 



3. The Jordan Valley. 



In the eastern portion of the grassless region I have described, 

 and about sixteen miles eastward of a line drawn north and south 

 through Jerusalem, runs the deep valley of the Jordan. Begin- 

 ning at the upper end of lake Banias and stretching southwards, 

 enclosing the Sea of Tiberias, a lake about six miles wide, and fill- 

 ing the breadth of the valley, it continues in the same southerly 

 direction and with nearly the same breadth, about seventy miles, 

 where it is again occupied by the Dead Sea, distant from whose 

 southern end ten miles, it comes to an abrupt termination. 



(1.) This valley is very much depressed below the level of the 

 Mediterranean,* a depression to which its excessive heat had 

 drawn the attention of travellers ; but this temperature was in part 

 accounted for by the position of the Ghor, enclosed between high 

 and almost perpendicular limestone mountains, reflecting the sun 

 from their white, glaring sides, into the valley below. Approxi- 

 mate results from barometrical measurement gave a depression from 

 three hundred to six hundred feet ; Dr. Robinson has adopted the 

 latter. But a minute and careful triangular survey, by a corps of 

 English engineers, of the whole country lying between the Jor- 

 dan x-^alley and the Mediterranean, has recently settled the depres- 

 sion of that valley below that sea, at one thousand three hundred 

 and eighty feet ; and consequently one thousand four hundred and 

 ten feet below the level of the Red Sea. 



(2.) The sides of the valley are bounded by steep hills of 

 limestone, those on the west from eight hundred to one thousand 

 four hundred feet high, those on the east from four hundred to 

 eight hundred feet higher. They are cleft by valleys, along whose 

 bottoms rush, during the rainy season, furious little torrents into 

 the great arterial current of the Jordan. This river, which gives 

 its name to the valley, and divides it into two nearly equal parts, 

 varies in width from eighty to one hundred and fifty feet, pouring 

 between its sedgy banks an unfailing supply of fresh water into 

 the Dead Sea. 



4. The Dead Sea. 



This mysterious lake, concerning which so many early, extrava- 

 gant accounts have been published, has never yet been satisfactori- 

 ly explored. The rash attempt of Costigan the Irishman in 1835, 



* See Vol. xLii, p. 214, of this Journal. 



