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have put in these minute touches of geological accuracy of which we have 
heard, and which are of the highest value in demonstrating the verba 
accuracy which prevails in the Old Testament. (Hear, hear.) 
A Member. — There is one question that I should like to ask Dr. Porter 
I have been much interested in what has been said about the southern 
end of the Dead Sea. Dr. Porter is here ranged against several learned 
authorities as to the theory of the site of Sodom and Gomorrah. I venture 
to think that Dr. Porter’s view is exceedingly likely ; and yet there is this 
difficulty : where is there a volcano sufficient to account for the eruptions to 
which reference is made ? Is it likely that the northern end of the lake, 
which Dr. Porter says, in paragraph 28, is “ like a huge crater,” formed part 
of a lake which must have existed in pre-historic times, or is it possible that 
the great depression it exhibits was of a volcanic character ? Had volcanic 
agency been at work, would there not have been a gradual raising of the sur- 
face, rather than a depression ? In the southern end of the lake, Dr. Porter 
says the depth varies from “ a few feet ” to “ a few inches,” but the depth is 
not very great in any case. How is volcanic agency discoverable in such a 
shallow slip of sea? We hear of the discoveries in the Zuider Zee and of the 
lake-dwellings found in Switzerland; is it not probable that in this case 
persistent research might make some further discoveries ? 
Dr. Porter. — I have no idea whatever whether there was in historic times 
a volcano in connection with the northern section of the lake ; but I think it 
is by no means improbable that in the southern section of the lake there may 
have been a small volcanic opening, and I will give you my reason for saying 
this. I have travelled in the northern section of Palestine, near the present 
town of Safed, which is a centre of volcanic action in that country, and I 
saw there, about two or three miles north-west of Safed, a little opening in 
the plain on the summit of the mountains — an opening that had manifestly 
been a crater, and which cannot be of a very ancient date. It is not more 
than eight or ten times the size of this room. I think it not unlikely — of 
course, this is merely a theory of my own — that there may have been some 
little opening such as this, in the centre, or near the centre, of the southern 
section of the lake. We know that at the present day, when earthquakes 
occur, large masses of bitumen are thrown up from the bottom of that 
southern section of the lake, and are found, by the Arabs, floating on the sur- 
face. Wffien on these occasions masses of bitumen are found thrown 
up from the bottom of the lake, they must come from some opening, and I 
think it most likely that some such opening may exist in the southern section 
of the lake. With regard to the dwellings, I have looked at the ruins north, 
east, and west of Galilee, and have found that they were built of the materials 
there at hand, and never, like portions of the Temples of Baalbeck, of 
materials brought from a great distance. My opinion is that the houses in the 
plain of Sodom were built in part of bricks formed of bituminous clay, and 
also partly of bituminous limestone, which is found there to a considerable 
extent, and that bituminous limestone would burn like coal, when once set on 
