660 
EXTRAOllDINAIlY CUUllENT IJSf NORWAY, 
production of the solanum melonyeha of Linnaeus. This is found in 
great abundance round Jericho, and in the neighbourhood of the 
Dead Sea. The dust with which it is sometimes filled, is the work of 
an insect, {teuihrede^ which pulverizes the whole of the inside, 
leaving the rind entire, and unchanged in colour. M. Leetzen does 
not agree with this conjecture ; he saw at Kerek a species of cotton, 
which he was told was produced from a fruit resembling a pomegra- 
nate, growing on the borders of the Dead Sea. It is this pulpless 
fruit which he is induced to think is the malum sodomeum. Viscount 
Chateaubriand saw a third fruit growing on a thorny shrub, which, 
before it is ripe, is filled with a corrosive and saline juice, and, when 
dried, yields blackish seeds resembling ashes, and tasting like bitter 
pepper. 
The asphaltum or bitumen, produced by this lake, floats upon its 
surface, and is stated to rise from the bottom of the water in huge 
lumps, which explode as soon as they are affected by the external 
air. It abounds in the neighbouring mountains, and resembles black 
pitch, from which it is only to be distinguished by its fetid and 
sulphureous smell. 
Extraordinary Current in Norway. 
About six leagues from Hundholm is the celebrated current of 
Salten (Saltenstroni,) which is even more dreaded than the Maelstrom; 
as all the inh.abitants of Saltensfiord have to cros^^ this dangerous 
passage, in which several persons annually perish. — There is (says 
the letter of a late visitor) really something wonderful in the violence 
of the current of the waters, when they are confined in this narrow 
passage, where the stream runs about seven French leagues in an 
hour, and forms, besides, a multitude of whirlpools, wherever it meets 
with any resistance from the sinuosities of its banks. 
The Valley of Waipio, in Hawaii or Owhyhee, one of the 
Sandwich Islands. 
Of this remarkable valley the representation and description are 
from Mr. Ellis’s Tour. 
“It was about, five o’clock in the afternoon of the 16th pf 
August, 1823, when Mr. Thurston and myself left Kapulena. Wishing 
to spend the Sabbath in the populous village of Waipio, w e travelled 
fast along the narrow paths bordered with long grass, or through the 
pleasant, well-cultivated plantations of the natives. The Sandwich 
Islanders have no idea of constructing their roads or foot-path in a 
straight line. In many parts, where the country was level and open, 
the paths from one village to another were not more than a foot 
wide, and very crooked. We often had occasion to notice this, but 
never passed over any so completely serpentine as those we travelled 
this evening. 
“ The sun had set when w'e reached the high cliff that formed the 
southern boundary of Waipio. Steep rocks, not less than five hun- 
dred feet high, rose immediately opposite. Viewed from the great 
elevatiofl at which we stood, the charming valley spread out beneath 
