258 THE HOLY LAND. 
CHAP, mentioned by Eusel-ius\ and by St. Jeronf. It 
VI 
. has been a chosen place for encampment m every 
contest carried on in this country, from the days 
of Nabuchodonosor, king of the Assyrians, (in the 
history of whose war with Arphaxad it is men- 
tioned as the great Plain of Esdrelom\) until the 
disastrous march of Napoleon Buonaparte from 
Egypt into Syria. Jews, Gentiles, Saracens, 
Christian Crusaders, and Anti- christian French- 
men, Egyptians, Persians, Druses, Turks, and 
Arabs, warriors out of " every nation which is 
under heaven," have pitched their tents upon 
the Plain of Esdraelon, and have beheld the va- 
rious banners of their nations wet with the dews 
of Thabor and of Hermon*. It has not oftea 
been noticed in books of travels, because it does 
not occur in the ordinary route pursued by 
(1) Eusehius ad voc. 'U(r^ar,X, Id. ad voc. 'AfjSxXa. Et ad voc. 
(2) Hieronymns, lib. de Sit. et Nom. Locorutn Hehra'icorum. 
(3) It is so written from the original, risS/ov /i'tya. 'Za^nXufi- Vid. 
Judith, c. i. 8. And aceordin.^ to our Version, "Nabuchodonosor, 
king of the Assyrians, sent unto all that dwelt in Persia, and to all 
that dwelt westward, and to those that dwelt in Cilicia and Damascus, 
and Lihanus, and Jnti-Lihanus, and to all that dwelt uj^on the sea- 
coast, and to those among the nations that were of Carmel, and Ga- 
laad, and the higher Galilee, and the great Plain of Esdrelom." 
(4) "We were sufficiently instructed by experience, what the holy 
Psalmist means by the * dew of Hrrmon .' our tents being as wet with it 
as if it had rained all night." Mnundrell's Journey, p. bl. Orf, 1721. 
