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HUDLESTON : GEOLOGY OF PALESTINE. 
8. The Jordan Valley n,nd Dead Sea Basin. — This is the most 
important of all the sections, and I have been oblig-ed to hurry over 
some of the others in order to arrive at it. The others being 
more or less necessary to a correct understanding of this one. By 
Dead Sea Basin I mean the whole of the longitudinal fissure from 
the slopes of Hermon to the water-shed near Akabah. The drainage 
of this finds its way into the Dead Sea, on the north by the Jordan 
valley, on the south by the Wady Arabah. From the surface of the 
Dead Sea it is dissipated by evaporation, whereby the level is 
maintained, and maintained so effectually, that a depth of nearly 
thirteen hundred feet intervenes between its surface and the level 
of the Mediterranean, so that the very clouds in this valley are 
often hundreds of feet below the level of the sea. 
Broadly speaking, there can be no doubt of the general con- 
nection between the Dead Sea fissure, the Gulf of Akabah, and the 
Red Sea, right away to the Straits of Babel-Mandeb, and the line of 
depression is carried north in the hollow of Syria, between Lebanon 
and Anti-Lebanon, though there above the level of the sea. Such a 
singular place has been fruitful in theories, and the destruction of 
the cities of the plain for instance, has led travellers to endeavour to 
account for the facts of biblical history, by statements too often 
entirely devoid of truth. The craters of De Saulcy, &c., have no 
existence. And it so happens that the volcanic eruptions are quite 
in another part of the country, as we have already seen. 
There are two theories which claim our attention as not being 
obviously inconsistent at first sight with physical facts. One is, that 
previous to the disaster of the Pentapolis, the river Jordan flowed 
into the Gulf of Akabah ; the other is, that the Red Sea came rig'ht 
up over the present water-shed, and filled the great fissure almost to 
the foot of Hermon. According to the first view, the whole system 
would be fresh water, according to the second it would be marine. 
Before entering on this question generally, we should direct our 
attention to the geological structure of this fissure basin, in connection 
with the high grounds of Judfea and Moab. Figure 7 is a 
diagramatic section of Palestine from the coast to the mountains 
of Moab. The Cretaceous limestones rising from beneath the waters 
